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I agree on methane being the ideal energy storage medium. It can be synthesisize but it is more efficient to use an anaerobic digester to turn organic waste to
by tastyfreeze 3y ago
I agree on methane being the ideal energy storage medium. It can be synthesisize but it is more efficient to use an anaerobic digester to turn organic waste to methane.
- pfdietz 3y agoMethane is not ideal. Liquid hydrocarbons would be much easier to store. They might be harder to make than methane, but then methane is harder to make than hydrogen (from non-biomass renewables), so by that metric methane isn't ideal either.
- tastyfreeze 3y agoIf we have the energy available for longer hydrocarbons, sure, do it. Methane is the feedstock. We would do well to produce as much methane as possible as local as possible. Everybody wants natural gas and we spend a lot of energy transporting it around the world.
- pfdietz 3y agoLonger chain hydrocarbons are more valuable as feedstocks than methane, too. Methane is used to make ammonia because it's so cheap.
- tastyfreeze 3y agoI'm not referring to the Haber-Bosch process. Fischer-Tropsch process also uses syngas mosty derived by steam reforming methane. FT is used to make a variety of hydrocarbons. If we are breaking hydrocarbons down to build them back from scratch might as well use the cheapest feedstock. That is currently methane. The nice thing about methane is we can get it almost for free, anywhere, using biology. That means we can continue our high energy lifestyle relying less on moving energy around.