 In fact, a lot more than CD’s could be made from polycarbonate |
CDs and DVDs to be made with CO2 emissions – Telegraph — Oh brother, what a stretch.
Carbon dioxide removed from smokestack emissions in order to slow global warming in the future could become a valuable raw material for the production of polycarbonate plastics, thanks to efforts by chemists around the world.
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That is interesting. Evidently, in the laboratory, it is possible to take CO2 from the atmosphere and produce any kind of petroleum product you wish- – -but with what I suspect is the same problem with making CD’s==it takes a whole lot of energy making it too expensive.
The advantages of keeping the infrastructure of production and distribution and btu’s per gallon and all that make synthetic gasoline very attractive. If they can discover a new catalyst, energy source, nano technology, laser beam to first produce the carbon chains==we’ll be off and running as pollution powers the planet.
The future is cataract bright!!
Agreed. Two thumbs up if they can get this done in an economical way.
CDs and DVDs are like vinyl LPs circa 1986. Make me a $20 solid-state 1 terabyte storage device out of CO2 and I’ll be impressed.
A bright future my fellow Americans, the RIAA will be on the forefront of saving the planet. You just embrace our DRM policy, and we’ll completely eliminate global climate change.
It’s nice to see scientists working on something useful for a change.
… or we could take the soot from smokestacks and make carbon footprints.
#6 JimR – now that’s funny.
The REAL question is: Does this process require less oil and less energy than the current process? If yes this is great news, if no this is crap.
What a pity that dialup is so last century, AOL could have solved global warming.
Of course it will take more energy! Don’t you understand chemistry at all? You burn organics to get CO2. Running that chemical process in reverse requires every bit of the energy released during the burn and then some.
This research is nothing more than some scientists jumping on the Global Warming money train.
Here, here #10. Though I’d call it the G.W. Gravy Train. Maybe this is why they want the US to reduce its carbon output, so China can corner the market on CD production. I’m sure that China’s smoke stacks are far dirtier than the US’s. Like the spring warmup, this story is just another excuse to wave the G.W. problem in our face.
First, there is no Global Warming problem that this “solution” (or any other) is going to fix. It’s assumed that the tiny percentage of CO2 that man is responsible for generating, is somehow more effective of climate than all that released by the earth’s plants, volcanos, and oceans. It isn’t. And it’s assumed that even the tiniest change of CO2 levels, somehow greatly swings temperature levels globaly. Not according to any Ice Core or Tree Ring data. Just the opposite. Temperature rises, followed by all the natural CO2 sources, 800 years later (most from the oceans). Man has no more effect on the earth’s climate, than a flee can tell an elephant which way to run. It goes where it goes, and we’re just along for the ride, fellow flees.
This “scare” smacks of some economic reshuffling act, that stands to benefit whoever gets in on the ground floor by investing in the right way. You can bet that Al Gore and friends are already so invested, to cash in bigtime.
See http://www.oism.org/news/index.htm
for a good article about Al Gore’s misleading message.
#10–Smith==does it take more energy to convert co2 into polycarbonates to make CD’s verses burning a tree? Of Course. THAT is so obvious I have to wonder why you think “just a little bit more.”
The obvious equation is does it take more energy to pump oil up out of the ground and refine it to make polycarbonates verses starting with co2 gases from the air or smokestacks. Right now, the answer is still yes, but at least it’s the right question.
#11–Glenn==you are a dope as well. Mankind can have no effect huh? I think one example EVERYBODY agrees on is use of carbonflourides and the ozone hole in the atmosphere? One can legitimately argue about how best to react/manage our pollution generating activities but to deny there is any effect is truly mentally deficient. Dolt.
If the polycarbonate is a cheap but rigid substrate for solar panels, and the CO2-to-polycarbonate factory itself is solar-powered, you’re getting close to a loop, using waste materials to dispose of waste materials.
There’s plenty of energy, it’s a question of time and place.
#13–jbelly–I think you are close==but even “free solar power” has a cost of production. One of the constant problems in becoming energy independent and carbon clean is that oil is so energy rich and cheap. Things are changing but change is always “hard.”
This might even be the article I read re co2 to gas:
http://tinyurl.com/32ue3j
I love science. I hope we have enough time to work all our issues out–but I kinda doubt it. Lots of various items coming together indicate to me a collapse of world fish stocks–and just last week, Thailand made it illegal to export rice because of food shortages.
It may suck to be a homo sapien.