"Imagine no restrictions on fossil-fuel usage and no global warming"

[Kevin Robert Dean]

Contact: James Rickman
elvis at lanl.gov
505-665-9203
DOE/Los Alamos National Laboratory 

Imagine no restrictions on fossil-fuel usage and no
global warming

ORLANDO, Fla., April 9, 2002 - Researchers at the U.S.
Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory
are studying a simple, cost effective method for
extracting carbon dioxide directly from the air -
which could allow sustained use of fossil fuels while
avoiding potential global climate change.

The method would allow researchers to harvest carbon
dioxide from the air, reducing buildup of the
so-called "greenhouse gas" in the atmosphere and
allowing it to be converted into fuel. A Los
Alamos-led research team today presented the topic at
the 223rd annual meeting of the American Chemical
Society in Orlando, Fla.

"Fossil fuel supplies are plentiful, and what will
limit the usage of fossil fuels is the potential
climatic and ecosystem changes you may see as a result
of rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere," said Los
Alamos researcher Manvendra Dubey. "If you can capture
atmospheric carbon dioxide, then you limit the
environmental impact of fossil fuels and you can
continue to use them. We have come up with a way to
capture and sequester the carbon dioxide that we are
putting in the atmosphere. Our approach is
particularly well suited to capturing CO2 from
numerous small sources such as automobiles that are
largely being ignored."

While many scientists are working on capturing or
sequestering carbon, Dubey and his colleagues' method
differs because it works on a dilute stream of CO2 in
the atmosphere as opposed to capturing more
concentrated forms found in power plant exhausts. The
method uses ordinary air with its average carbon
dioxide concentration of about 370 parts per million.

It utilizes the wind and natural atmospheric mixing to
transport CO2 to a removal site, and it is the only
means available to capture CO2 generated from
transportation sources and small, dispersed sources
that account for nearly half of all carbon dioxide
emissions.

The air is passed over an extraction agent, for
example a solution of quicklime, the active agent in
some cement. As the air passes over the extraction
structure, the carbon dioxide in the air reacts with
the quicklime and becomes converted to calcium
carbonate (limestone), a solid that forms and falls to
the bottom of the extractor.

The calcium carbonate is then heated to yield pure
carbon dioxide and quicklime, which is recycled back
into the extractor. The purified and liberated carbon
dioxide can then be sequestered as a gas by direct
injection into the ground or it could be reacted with
minerals to form a solid. Carbon dioxide gas also can
be sold commercially to the petrochemical industry,
which uses large quantities of it to extract fossil
fuels. Of course, because the process uses existing
air, it does not need to be located near any
particular elevated source of carbon dioxide. It
captures carbon dioxide from all sources by harnessing
wind as a no-cost transportation vector.

"The carbon dioxide comes to the facility on its own,"
Dubey said. "And because treated air is discharged,
the overall concentration of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere gradually decreases over time. Using this
method on a large enough scale, it may be possible to
return atmospheric carbon dioxide levels to
pre-Industrial-Age concentrations. Given the
possibility our climate system can change abruptly,
this possibility is very exciting."

Cost of the entire process is equivalent to about 20
cents per gallon of gasoline - a nominal cost when one
considers the recent price fluctuations at gasoline
pumps across the nation, Dubey said. A typical
extraction facility that could extract all current
carbon dioxide emissions would require only an area of
one square yard per person in the developed world. A
facility of sufficient size could be located in arid
regions, since discharged air that is deficient in
carbon dioxide could have consequences on nearby plant
life.

Large expanses of desert would not be affected by the
CO2 deficit however, and could provide the wide-open
spaces necessary both for the facility and to allow
the discharged air to become well mixed with the
atmosphere again.

The next step for Dubey and his colleagues is to use
intense computer models to optimize the configuration
of the extractor as well as design alternative
chemicals for extraction. Dubey's research colleagues
include Hans Ziock, Scott Elliott and William S. Smith
of Los Alamos; Klaus Lackner, formerly of Los Alamos
and now also at Columbia University; and Pat Grimes of
Grimes Associates of Scotch Plains, N.J. Los Alamos
National Laboratory is operated by the University of
California for the National Nuclear Security
Administration (NNSA) of the U.S. Department of Energy
and works in partnership with NNSA's Sandia and
Lawrence Livermore national laboratories to support
NNSA in its mission.

Los Alamos enhances global security by ensuring the
safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile,
developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons
of mass destruction, and solving problems related to
energy, environment, infrastructure, health and
national security concerns. 

For more Los Alamos news releases, visit World Wide
Web site http://www.lanl.gov/external/news/releases 



=====
Kevin Dean
Buffalo, NY
ICQ: 8616001
AIM: KDean75206
Buffalo Activist Network
http://www.buffaloactivist.net
http://www.yaysoft.com

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