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From: Bruce Sterling <bruces@well.com>
To: yyyy@spamassassin.taint.org
Subject: Viridian Note 00328: Fuel from CO2

Key concepts:  Nakamichi Yamasaki, hydrocarbon
generation, carbon dioxide, industrial chemistry

Attention Conservation Notice: Yet another
weird Nipponese scheme, about some miracle
gizmo that runs on pollution

Links:

Tornados in Britain?  Maybe it really is the 51st State.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2002362050,00.html

Newfangled suntan pill alleged to have peculiar side-
effects.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow.asp?art_id=18672487

See all those really bright places? Well, that's
where the Greenhouse comes from.
http://www3.cosmiverse.com/news/earthobservatory/0802/images/land_ocean_ice_lights_080602_1bi
g.jpg 

The West Nile plague has reached Austin.
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/17239/story.htm

---------------------------------------------------
Entries in the Global Civil Society Design Contest.

From: Steven W. Schuldt <swschuldt*mac.com>
http://www.americanrobotz.com/images2/Soon_GlobalCivilSocietyLaptop.jpg

From: Ben Davis <bend*earthlink.net>
http://www.digitaleverything.com/GlobalComputer.htm

From: Joerg F. Wittenberger <Joerg.Wittenberger*pobox.com>
http://www.askemos.org/ 
http://www.askemos.org:9080/RomePaper.pdf

From: Scott Vandehey <scot*spaceninja.com >
http://spaceninja.com/viridian/notebook.html

From: Bob Morris <bob*bomoco.com>
http://viridianrepository.com/GlobalCivil/

From: Anonymous
http://home.freiepresse.de/befis/zx2000.html
http://apollo.spaceports.com/~bodo4all/zx/zx97.htm
http://www.vkb.co.il/

From: Jim Thompson <jim*musenki.com>
http://www.simputer.org
http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/ptech/07/05/india.simputer.reut/index.html

From: Mike Rosing <eresrch*eskimo.com>
http://www.eskimo.com/~eresrch/viridian

From: Till Westermayer <till*tillwe.de>
http://www.westermayer.de/till/projekte/02gcsdl.htm

From: Duncan Stewart <stewarts*stewarts.org?>
http://www.stewarts.org/viridian/GCS

From: R. Charles Flickinger <idlewild*mac.com>
http://homepage.mac.com/iHUG/GCS2000.html

From: Kevin Prichard <kevin*indymedia.org>
http://www.nah6.com/
http://www.nah6.com/nah6-h2k2_files/v3_document.html

From: Dave Phelan <dphelan*pavilion.co.uk

"Please find my entry here:"
http://www.btinternet.com/~dphelan/viridian/gcs-computer.html

"I'm no graphic artist == the feature list is the 
important part of the design."

dphelan*pavilion.co.uk  Blog: 
http://www.btinternet.com/~dphelan

This contest expires in four days:   August 15, 2002. 
----------------------------------------------------
Source:
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99992620

"Carbon dioxide turned into hydrocarbon fuel 
(((Please, no immediate lectures on the second law of 
thermodynamics. I have plenty of those.)))

"16:00 02 August 02

"A way to turn carbon dioxide into hydrocarbons has caused 
a big stir at an industrial chemistry conference in New 
Brunwick, New Jersey. Nakamichi Yamasaki of the Tokushima 
Industrial Technology Center in Japan says he has a 
process that makes propane and butane at relatively low 
temperatures and pressures."

Link: Yes, he actually exists:
http://www.it.sakura.ne.jp/~koatsu/c_journal/ab/1_10/01-2.html
http://www.itc.pref.tokushima.jp/English/eindex.html

"Making fuel from greenhouse gases

"While his work still needs independent verification,  
(((okay, go fetch us some, then))) if he can make even 
heavier hydrocarbons, it might be possible to make petrol. 
It has carbon chains that are between five and 12 atoms 
long == butane is four atoms long.  ((("That's right, 
Professor: I just hook it up to the sky and I make 
gasoline!")))

   "The work suggests the tantalising prospect that CO2, 
the main greenhouse gas, could be recycled instead of 
being pumped into the atmosphere.

    "Many people have tried before to make hydrocarbons by 
mixing carbon with hydrogen gas in a reaction chamber at 
very high temperatures, but yields have always been 
pitiful. Yamasaki has used hydrochloric acid as his source 
of hydrogen ions. ((("But where are we s'posed to get all 
that hydrochloric acid?" Yes, I know, I know.)))

    "He bubbles the CO2 into a reaction vessel where it is 
heated to about 300 C at 100 times atmospheric pressure. 
The heat and pressure are low enough, says Yamasaki, to 
make it feasible to scale up the reaction so it can run on 
a power station's waste heat. (((Imagine the fun when a 
giant tank of pressurized acid blows up.)))

"Iron powder 

   "Using iron powder as a catalyst, Yamasaki says he has 
made substantial amounts of methane, ethane, propane and 
butane, which he was able to vent off as gases when the 
mixture cooled. If he can improve the catalyst's 
performance he is hopeful of making heavier hydrocarbons 
such as petrol, too. 

    "William Siegfried, who has lead similar experiments 
at the University of Minnesota in the twin cities of 
Minneapolis and St Paul, says his group was only able to 
make methane at far higher temperatures. But his process 
also used a nickel-based alloy as a catalyst, rather than 
iron.

    "Siegfried's group was investigating whether natural 
methane deposits might have formed chemically with the 
metal in rocks acting as a catalyst rather than forming 
from the decay of rotting biological material over aeons.  
(((Paging Thomas Gold! "Deep Hot Biosphere" calling on 
line one.)))

   "Unless Yamasaki's technology can make the more 
valuable heavier hydrocarbons such as petroleum, which are 
liquid at room temperature, it will not be much more use 
than present-day bioreactors, in which bacteria that like 
to feed on CO2 are induced to produce methane. 'Organisms 
have a special talent for that kind of reaction,' says 
Siegfried.

O=c=O O=c=O O=c=O O=c=O
FED-EX IS HERE WITH
YOUR WORLD-SAVING
MIRACLE GIZMO
O=c=O O=c=O O=c=O O=c=O


