Carbon Capture and Synthetic Fuels

As we’ve noted in the past, the idea of capturing CO2 from the atmosphere is completely unfeasible, since 99.96% of the air around is something other than CO2 (mostly nitrogen).  However, there are environments that change this equation radically, cement plants being one of them, where the concentration of CO2 emissions is as high as 30% (versus .04%).

Now, this brings the subject of synthetic fuels into the realm of possibility.  Sure, if you want to make gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel, you’ll need two other things: hydrogen (which can come from electrolyzing water), and a considerable amount of energy, as these processes are heavily endothermic, meaning that energy must be supplied from external sources.

The good news is that we have enormous amounts of off-peak wind and nuclear that are wasted every day.  Please see: Doty WindFuels.