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NNadir

(33,511 posts)
2. Tributyrin and other esters of glycerol have been considered as oxygenated...
Mon Aug 1, 2016, 12:00 AM
Aug 2016

...fuels; one of the links to a post of mine elsewhere in the OP gives a discussion of another fuel oxygenate derived from glycerol, soketal, and even describes a completely biological route to it.

Soketal is the ketal of acetone derived from glycerol.

Of more interest in terms of carbon capture and sequestration is the conversion of glycerol into acrolein, a highly carcinogenic compound, but nonetheless, and important industrial synthon.

A recent paper in the same journal I referenced in the OP discusses the glycerol to acrolein route:

Hierarchical ZSM-5 Zeolite Synthesized by an Ultrasound-Assisted Method as a Long-Life Catalyst for Dehydration of Glycerol to Acrolein

Acrolein is a potential precursor to both propylene, used in the synthesis of polypropylene polymers, and methacrylate, used in the synthesis of acrylic polymers.

Thus used, these chemicals represent a form of fixed permanently sequestered carbon, although, of course, plastics are a huge environmental problem on their own.

I am not, however, a big fan of high value added isolation of pure biologically sourced molecules except in esoteric cases. The economic concern is that while glycerol is currently experiencing glut conditions and can be had basically for free, transport costs and the seasonal availability limit the economics. Currently polymers are made pretty much under continuous processes, not batch processes.

I'm not sure that enough biomass will survive the rapid climate change we are now sure to experience, especially given the ongoing disaster of the 2010's. It may be that the most available sources of biomass will be massive outbreaks of problematic seaweeds such as those recently observed in Florida or the very unfortunate oubreak of microcystin containing algae in Lake Erie last year.

This is poor pickings, but it may be all future generations will have. I suspect that future generations will be required to turn to the oceans, assuming they survive in some viable form, since, for just one example, much of the terrestrial phosphorous will have been depleted.

What will be required for the collection of this biomass, and for its use as feed for hydrothermal reformation to hydrogen and carbon oxides will be greenhouse gas free pumps and/or ships. Only nuclear powered pumps and nuclear powered ships can do this job with high carbon capture efficiency, and thus, the technology will require a different culture than the unfortunate one in which we live. This will fall to the future generations we have screwed beyond any semblance of ethical restraints, and they will have fewer resources, and be much more impoverished than we are, if they exist at all as a result of our blank stupidity.

We have proved to be criminally insane in our approach to the future, and one hopes enough knowledge will remain after us that they, the survivors of our stupidity, may have some hope of restoring the planet. It's a long shot now, and my general view of the future in which my own sons will live is increasingly dystopian, but I can hope I'm wrong.

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