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Yes, and: the question revolves around total financial and material capital needed to transition away from fossil fuels. Synthetic fuels are potentially valuab

Yes, and: the question revolves around total financial and material capital needed to transition away from fossil fuels. Synthetic fuels are potentially valuable because they allow existing capital assets (internal combustion engines and the industry that produces them, fuel distribution infrastructure) to continue to be used. I am glad to see research into them continue- it's difficult to predict what will scale well economically in five or ten or thirty years.

PaulHoule 4y ago
The Fischer-Trospch process has a stupendously high capital cost because, even though cheap catalysts work, chemical reactions that build up larger molecules (that can proceed explosively under some conditions) compete with chemical reactions that break molecules down and have to be balanced on a knife edge to get hydrocarbons of the right length. For any normal industrial process people would be really delighted that they could use iron as a catalyst but the economics of FT are so bad they've scoured the periodic table for something better and not had much improvement.
- jmole 4y ago
  Why cant you just distill them after producing them, instead of worrying about getting exactly the right length?
  - PaulHoule 4y ago
    Main issue is they want to be length 1 methane or length 1000+ polyethylene
mfer 4y ago
The cost to transition away from fossil fuels isn’t really talked about much. For example, our electric grid can’t handle everyone using electric cars. Everything from electricity production to distribution needs to be upgraded. There is a massive cost to that.
- ajross 4y ago
  > For example, our electric grid can’t handle everyone using electric cars. Everything from electricity production to distribution needs to be upgraded. There is a massive cost to that. Cite for that? That's simply not true. In fact of all major infrastructure media in modern society, electrical transmission is by far the cheapest to upgrade. Even discounting industrial electricity and adding on DC charging of the EV, my household usage has gone up 35%. You really don't think society can absorb a 35% growth in one infrastructure sector? That's just silly. Obviously there are "costs", but there's no justification for "can't handle" or "massive". At all.
  - ozzydave 4y ago
    And the majority of people will charge when power is cheapest, meaning peak power won’t increase nearly as much.
  - briffle 4y ago
    plus there are other significant changes that can change in that time. HVDC power transmission lines lose something like 3% of their power over 600 miles, where AC ones lose closer to 7%. And use much less precious metals, since they require 2 lines instead of 3.
    - thworp 4y ago
      Is that 3% for the cable only or the entire system including conversion to AC at both ends?
- brk 4y ago
  All the crypto mining dying off should free up a lot of grid resources for EVs. I've heard the "grid can't handle all EVs" statement, but have not seen anything backing up the claim. I believe the grid can in fact handle EVs becoming prevalent. We might need more power generation, which could be new plants, and/or residential solar. Baring some kind of crazy legislation requiring ICE vehicles to be crushed or permanently parked, we are decades away from a scenario where pure EVs are the dominant vehicle type on the road. There are just too many serviceable ICE vehicles in play to expect them to really go away in the next quarter century or so. That allows plenty of time for anything the current power generation and distribution infrastructure lacks to be adequately addressed.
themitigating 4y ago
Synthetic fuels are potentially valuable because they allow existing capital assets (internal combustion engines and the industry that produces them, fuel distribution infrastructure) to continue to be used. Won't engines have to be modified and reprogrammed?
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  For alcohol, DME and other single entity fuels you may need to change the engine, but synthetic hydrocarbons really are a drop in replacement.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    Most engines that run on gasoline will run unmodified on LNG and many other combustibles besides, alcohol would work but the way in which it and ethanol attack various materials found in the fuel systems of vehicles means that your problem is likely not going to be the engine but further upstream towards the tank (seals, membranes).
- Oxidation 4y ago
  According to this article: maybe not, since they used an unmodified engine.

PaulHoule 4y ago

The Fischer-Trospch process has a stupendously high capital cost because, even though cheap catalysts work, chemical reactions that build up larger molecules (that can proceed explosively under some conditions) compete with chemical reactions that break molecules down and have to be balanced on a knife edge to get hydrocarbons of the right length. For any normal industrial process people would be really delighted that they could use iron as a catalyst but the economics of FT are so bad they've scoured the periodic table for something better and not had much improvement.

jmole 4y ago
Why cant you just distill them after producing them, instead of worrying about getting exactly the right length?
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  Main issue is they want to be length 1 methane or length 1000+ polyethylene

mfer 4y ago

The cost to transition away from fossil fuels isn’t really talked about much. For example, our electric grid can’t handle everyone using electric cars. Everything from electricity production to distribution needs to be upgraded. There is a massive cost to that.

ajross 4y ago
> For example, our electric grid can’t handle everyone using electric cars. Everything from electricity production to distribution needs to be upgraded. There is a massive cost to that. Cite for that? That's simply not true. In fact of all major infrastructure media in modern society, electrical transmission is by far the cheapest to upgrade. Even discounting industrial electricity and adding on DC charging of the EV, my household usage has gone up 35%. You really don't think society can absorb a 35% growth in one infrastructure sector? That's just silly. Obviously there are "costs", but there's no justification for "can't handle" or "massive". At all.
- ozzydave 4y ago
  And the majority of people will charge when power is cheapest, meaning peak power won’t increase nearly as much.
- briffle 4y ago
  plus there are other significant changes that can change in that time. HVDC power transmission lines lose something like 3% of their power over 600 miles, where AC ones lose closer to 7%. And use much less precious metals, since they require 2 lines instead of 3.
  - thworp 4y ago
    Is that 3% for the cable only or the entire system including conversion to AC at both ends?
brk 4y ago
All the crypto mining dying off should free up a lot of grid resources for EVs. I've heard the "grid can't handle all EVs" statement, but have not seen anything backing up the claim. I believe the grid can in fact handle EVs becoming prevalent. We might need more power generation, which could be new plants, and/or residential solar. Baring some kind of crazy legislation requiring ICE vehicles to be crushed or permanently parked, we are decades away from a scenario where pure EVs are the dominant vehicle type on the road. There are just too many serviceable ICE vehicles in play to expect them to really go away in the next quarter century or so. That allows plenty of time for anything the current power generation and distribution infrastructure lacks to be adequately addressed.

themitigating 4y ago

Synthetic fuels are potentially valuable because they allow existing capital assets (internal combustion engines and the industry that produces them, fuel distribution infrastructure) to continue to be used. Won't engines have to be modified and reprogrammed?

PaulHoule 4y ago
For alcohol, DME and other single entity fuels you may need to change the engine, but synthetic hydrocarbons really are a drop in replacement.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  Most engines that run on gasoline will run unmodified on LNG and many other combustibles besides, alcohol would work but the way in which it and ethanol attack various materials found in the fuel systems of vehicles means that your problem is likely not going to be the engine but further upstream towards the tank (seals, membranes).
Oxidation 4y ago
According to this article: maybe not, since they used an unmodified engine.