Engineers have found a way to
synthesise everyday vehicle fuel from air and water, in a revolutionary
breakthrough.


Aberdeen, Scotland - With one of the
world's most famous railway lines,
Stockton-on-Tees has already given birth to one transport revolution. On
September 27, 1825, it carried the first
ever passenger rail service along its
40km route through industrial north-east England - changing the world forever.
EwToday, it is at the centre of another
technological breakthrough that some
scientists and engineers believe could
be just as significant as steam
locomotion.

A small company working in two
converted shipping containers says it has found a way to make petrol from fresh air and water. Air Fuel Synthesis Chief Executive Peter Harrison says the
process could help curb climate change
by providing a cleaner alternative to oil.

"We’ve taken carbon dioxide from
air and hydrogen from water and
turned these elements into petrol."
- Peter Harrison, Air Fuel Synthesis

"We've taken carbon dioxide from air
and hydrogen from water and turned
these elements into petrol," he told Al
Jazeera. "For a country like the UK it
means we could create all the fuel you
want from renewable energy."

The 58-year-old civil engineer, who used to work in the offshore oil industry,
describes it as an amazing project to be
involved with. Harrison explained that they use a 30 foot tower on top of their first container to capture CO2 from the air. The process of separation involves combining the air with sodium hydroxide and passing it through an electrolyser. A similar method is used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. The CO2 and hydrogen are then synthesised to make methanol, and eventually petrol. It cost them around $800,000 to build the plant. Since the mini-refinery was switched on in August, they have made 15 litres of fuel that could be used to power any normal car.

Philippa Oldham, head of transport at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, is excited at the breakthrough. "The
process of making petrol from air is
relatively straightforward and really does work," she told Al Jazeera.

"This technology could make driving a
conventional petrol car carbon neutral.
CO2 is emitted when fuel is used in a
car, therefore, for the car to be classed
as carbon neutral, CO2 can be captured
from the atmosphere and, using simple
chemical reactions and electricity,
turned back into fuel, where the whole
cycle begins again - which means that
the net amount of CO2 in the atmosphere remains constant."

Lots of power
Air Fuel Synthesis is now seeking just
over $8m to fund a commercial plant
they hope would be capable of
producing one ton of petrol a day by
2015.
The barrier to expansion is that the
process uses lots of power. Much more
energy is fed into the plant, in the form
of electricity, than is extracted from it.
Because of this, Lee Cronin, professor of
chemistry at the University of Glasgow,
is cautious about its potential.

"The bottom line - making very
optimistic assumptions about their
efficiency, if this company was to scale
up to produce enough gasoline to meet
demand in the USA, it would require half the world's energy consumption every day," he said. "That is clearly
unacceptable.”

"Even if they can achieve
impressive improvements in the
overall energy balance in synthetic
hydrocarbons, there will still be
limits on the amount of renewable
energy we can generate."
- Patrick Harvie, Scottish Green Party He added that the company had nonetheless developed an interesting
new system and discussing it gets us
thinking. If we could take really cheap renewable energy, such as solar power, and produce carbon neutral fuel for cars or aeroplanes, the potential is there to
create new revenue streams for desert
regions with low populations. It would
also enable Gulf states such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia, which have an abundance of sunshine, to diversify their economies.

Keith Allot, chief climate change adviser
for WWF, said: "I think it is too early to
say how big this could become, but it is
certainly interesting and really worth
exploring. If we are going to make an
impact on climate change, we need to
change energy systems at every level."
The UK, and particularly Scotland, is
currently investing in lots of wind power. Scotland's renewable energy industry already produces more electricity than either coal or gas and it is growing fast.

Renewable electricity
One problem for policy makers is that
the wind changes from day to day and
season to season. What do you with the
energy that is created when it blows
hard outside of peak hours and demand
for electricity is low?
Harrison believes Scotland's ambitious
targets mean there will be plenty of
spare power. "There is a lot of renewable energy around at the moment that is wasted," he said. "What we want to do is to catch all that spare renewable electricity and use it in other forms.

Petrol is something that is very useful
and easy to store." Scottish Green Party co-leader Patrick Harvie is more sceptical. He warned that technological advances should not allow people to pretend that nothing else needs to change.

"Even if they can achieve impressive
improvements in the overall energy
balance in synthetic hydrocarbons, there will still be limits on the amount of
renewable energy we can generate, and so there will be a need to reduce
demand for energy including from
aviation and other transport uses."

At its site in Stockton-on-Tees, Air Fuel
Synthesis is demonstrating its clean,
green fuel on a small motorised scooter.
They believe they have passed a major
milestone on the way to carbon neutral
motoring that doesn't damage the
environment.

Soon, they hope their fuel will be
powering Formula One racing cars. Peter Harrison says that, to start with, they are targeting their product at motor sports, which need to improve their green credentials.

Eventually, they hope that petrol
produced from water and air could be
used in everything from cars doing the
school run to local buses and trans-
Atlantic jets. This technology is still in its early stages, but it offers an alluring glimpse of a different kind of future.

m.aljazeera.com/se/2013110111039373166