Comment on Capturing CO2 With Copper, Scientists Generate 'Green Methane'

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Auzy@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

That makes no sense…

Australia keeps less than 21 days of petrol of all types. Why would we need to store months? This seems like one of those silly arguments where it’s assumed incorrectly that the sun stops shining and the wind stops blowing (which only happens in limited locations).

And when I say including undiscovered, I mean its only getting better. For grid energy storage, energy density isn’t an issue. Energy density is ONLY an issue for transportation and phones. We just need to scale up the technology now, and thats already rapidly happening.

This entire thing comes down to efficiency at the end of the day. The efficiency of the conversion here is 85%, and you still need to convert it back into energy (which is hugely inefficient). Even if converting it back to energy is 75% efficient (it’s likely not), that’s only 64% efficient.

Batteries are 94%. Even Vanadium Redox Flow is 75-90%. There’s plenty of low density low cost efficient batteries (especially now Sodium batteries are available)

Also…

  1. “If we use methane as is, we’ve accomplished this” - You can’t just swap current products with methane… Even if you did, petrol engines are totally inefficient. We’re likely talking not even talking 50% efficient

  2. “Replacing wood for heating”. We already HAVE a solution for heating. Burning methane is less than 100% efficient max. Heat pumps are already at 500% efficiency and the efficiency is growing.

  3. Why would you want to store it like oil? It’s incredibly toxic… And, burning it is inefficient.

This has it’s applications, but its likely more competing with Hydrogen, NOT batteries. Also, this is still a research paper, not a commercial product. By the time it’s commercial, batteries might be 50% cheaper again…

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