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Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

terraformindustries.wordpress.com

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Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#81

Post by tgtweak »

joe_the_user wrote: post #29
carbonguy wrote: post #15

As a "carbon industry" observer, this is pretty exciting news. I've had my eye on Terraform Industries for a while and love what they're doing; they're one of the few groups that actually seem to understand the implications of what it will take to shift to a carbon-neutral economy, and their core insight about the economics of atmospheric fuel synthesis is one of those "obvious when you hear it" ideas: solar electric…

It looks good. I wish their headline was "natural gas from solar power" 'cause many things labeled "carbon neutral" wind-up being conventional petrochemicals plus some worthless "offsets" baloney.

In theory you can use any power source - hydroelectric, geothermal, nuclear, wind - but the benefit to solar is that you can fully utilize it when the sun is shining and store the output (compressed natural gas) for storage, transportation and use off-hours.

You could also technically use this as a grid-battery, taking in excess grid energy when it is cheap and converting it into natural gas that can be run back through a gas peaking plant that spins up to meet peak demand. You could also look into SOFC fuel cell plants [1] to convert the stored natural gas into electricity at 60% and heat at 30% (the heat is high temperature which is good for cogeneration or as a direct heat source). There would need to be some very large spreads in margin on those to make up for the fact you're likely double-dipping on inefficiencies when going from electricity in -> natgas production -> storage -> generation -> electricity out.

On that same note though - in some free and open energy markets it is not unheard of to buy at $200/MWh at peak on-demand - plenty of margin for arbitrage there - as the tesla megapack facilities have demonstrated in Australia. In comparison a 4MWh megapack facility (2MW in/2MW out) is priced at $1.9M before installation [2]

[1]https://assets.bosch.com/media/en/global/stories/sofc/solid-...

[2]https://twitter.com/SawyerMerritt/status/1643488856946122754...

(updated for M/Mega - thanks)

Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#82

Post by [deleted] »

willio58 wrote: post #58

While this is impressive to some degree I just today watched Climate Town’s “Natural Gas is Scamming America” ( https://youtu.be/K2oL4SFwkkw ) and the entire natural gas industry is tainted beyond belief for me now. It’s not like they were a positive thing in my view before, but on the whole natural gas seems to be just as if not more detrimental than coal for climate change mainly due to how much is leaked out but a…

[deleted]

Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#85

Post by maerF0x0 »

spenczar5 wrote: post #50
maerF0x0 wrote: post #38

What are some applications where its worth taking the highest grade energy (electricity) and turning it into a lower grade (eg liquid fuels), rather than electrifying the application? Electricity to motion is significantly more efficient per input energy than burning fuel->heat-> gaseous expansion->drive a piston->convert to rotation chain. What am I missing about this?

You’re missing density of storage. Gasoline and natural gas are in the region of 50 MJ/kg, while batteries are more like 10MJ/kg or lower. That 5x factor is what stops us from having electric airplanes.

I actually think the reason we don't have electric airplanes has to do with traction vs propulsion.

Eg: spinning a jet engine to propel air backwards is very different than spinning a motor that is (through a series of solid objects) directly connect to the ground.

and while a battery is only 1/5th density, the motors on a tesla deliver 3x the range per energy compared to a prius. (not true break even, but impressive that one of the most efficient hybrid ICE cannot compare KWh for KWh to a battery + electric)

Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#86

Post by luhn »

gorjusborg wrote: post #77
willio58 wrote: post #58

While this is impressive to some degree I just today watched Climate Town’s “Natural Gas is Scamming America” ( https://youtu.be/K2oL4SFwkkw ) and the entire natural gas industry is tainted beyond belief for me now. It’s not like they were a positive thing in my view before, but on the whole natural gas seems to be just as if not more detrimental than coal for climate change mainly due to how much is leaked out but a…

If the natural gas is captured from the atmosphere, a spill will be bad, but no worse than before the capture happened, right?

They're capturing CO2 from the atmosphere, if they leak methane back out to the atmosphere that's much, much worse. Over a 20-year period, methane has ~80x the warming potential of CO2.

Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#87

Post by pfdietz »

groby_b wrote: post #73
pfdietz wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We use all that because natural gas is cheap. If hydrogen were cheaper than natural gas, we'd use that instead, at least for the industrial processes, and we'd switch away from combustion of a gas in the distributed residential/commercial applications.

And if wishes were horses... ;) Kidding aside: That's the whole point. This is a project that can work without retooling infra all over the world. It's a drop-in replacement to get to carbon-neutral fuel. This solves problems right now, with limited investment. This isn't about perfection. This is specifically about "works right now, cheap, no impact on the surrounding infrastructure". (Also, strong doubts on "we'd u…

I don't believe their cost figures (look above; their 250/t for CO2 doesn't jibe), and I think electrification of most residential/commercial uses will be the superior solution (it's more efficient even if the electricity is produced by burning natural gas). Industrially, hydrogen is just fine. After all, industry already manipulates vast quantities of hydrogen.

The fossil fuel uses that are the most difficult to displace involve liquid fuels for transportation; natural gas has limited use there.

Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#88

Post by _cenw »

willio58 wrote: post #58

While this is impressive to some degree I just today watched Climate Town’s “Natural Gas is Scamming America” ( https://youtu.be/K2oL4SFwkkw ) and the entire natural gas industry is tainted beyond belief for me now. It’s not like they were a positive thing in my view before, but on the whole natural gas seems to be just as if not more detrimental than coal for climate change mainly due to how much is leaked out but a…

Green hydrogen and other "e-fuels" are an attempt to keep the gas industries infrastructure alive and relevant. If you see someone break down the math it makes zero sense, it just sounds nice.

Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#89

Post by _cenw »

gorjusborg wrote: post #77
willio58 wrote: post #58

While this is impressive to some degree I just today watched Climate Town’s “Natural Gas is Scamming America” ( https://youtu.be/K2oL4SFwkkw ) and the entire natural gas industry is tainted beyond belief for me now. It’s not like they were a positive thing in my view before, but on the whole natural gas seems to be just as if not more detrimental than coal for climate change mainly due to how much is leaked out but a…

If the natural gas is captured from the atmosphere, a spill will be bad, but no worse than before the capture happened, right?

Being realistic, we're going to put any CO2 we manage to pull out of the atmosphere (if we can do it at cost at all) on a balance sheet.

We already do this in various places. For instance, if you dedicate land to growing a forest in Germany to offset your carbon emissions, it is added to the emission trade balance of the country no matter if you intend for it or not - you can't offset.

Hamburg Airport tried to do this as a publicity stunt, and only later noticed they're doing nothing for the CO2 bottom line.

Re: Terraform makes carbon neutral natural gas

#90

Post by solid_fuel »

CrazyStat wrote: post #80
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd be interested in a quantitative analysis here. Methane is much worse, but sunlight has broken most of it down after a decade or so. CO2 is comparatively forever. Presumably there's a point where the lines cross and leaking green methane is still a win. I guess it just comes down to where those lines cross and whether we deem that an acceptable goal.

Sunlight breaks methane down into CO2, so I don’t think there’s much of a win there.

But that CO2 is then theoretically recaptured to make more fuel, right? At least if the carbon in the methane is sourced from the atmosphere in the first place.
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