How do we capture the C02 for this stuff? Here's one way:
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If we're dependent on oil but concerned about carbon dioxide emissions, why don't we just capture the CO2 we emit?
Actually, researchers are looking into this right now. Professor Chris Jones at the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) and his team have come up with a material called hyperbranched aminosilica (HAS) that captures and stores carbon dioxide emissions.
When HAS was combined with sand, the chemists found that the resulting compound was capable of trapping carbon dioxide when flue gasses -- emissions found in smokestacks -- passed through it.
The HAS compound not only captures CO2, it hangs onto it. To release the carbon dioxide, the material must be heated, and the CO2 that's released can be captured and stored (either as a gas or cooled into liquid form) in a process called carbon sequestration. This is actually more exciting than it sounds. Not only will it reduce CO2 emissions, it makes it possible to reuse the captured CO2 to feed biofuel stock. One company grows algae in Louisiana for use as a biofuel. The algae are fed with captured CO2.
Hyperbranched aminosilica has some advantages over other methods of carbon sequestration. For one, it's recyclable. HAS can be used over and over again; the Georgia Tech researchers tested one batch 12 times and found that there was no noticeable decrease in adsorption [source: Georgia Tech]. And the material also isn't affected by moisture, which is a plus since water vapor is present in flue gases. It's also low on required energy input; the only energy needed comes from the generation of the heat that releases the CO2.
But there are some challenges that face the project. For one, the CO2/amine reaction that binds the carbon dioxide to the branches generates heat. The researchers found that the aminosilica captures CO2 best at cool temperatures, so they must figure out how to get rid of the heat that's produced quickly, so the CO2 binds.
http://auto.howstuffworks.com/tailpipe-capture-co21.htm
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No need for massive amounts of energy to be used to go out and
find it in the air...just take the C02 right from it's source! Then, eventually - as this process is perfected, maybe it can be placed in tailpipes of cars that run on the Green Crude-derived gasoline, like an "oil filter" for exhaust gasses. Every 1000 (or whatever) miles you replace it, and send it to the nearest Carbon dioxide dump. The dump gives it to Sapphire, and they reuse the C02 by feeding it to their algae...repeat cycle.
