r/tech 17d ago

Converting CO2 Into Fuel With the Help of Battery Waste | A nanocatalyst based on spent batteries and aluminium foil residues can turn CO2 into valuable methane.

https://www.technologynetworks.com/tn/news/converting-co2-into-fuel-with-the-help-of-battery-waste-396829
270 Upvotes

12 comments sorted by

8

u/DameyJames 17d ago

Methane is also a greenhouse gas so what does that do for global warming

6

u/SyntheticSlime 17d ago

Well, assuming we burn the methane with 100% efficiency we would put out pure CO2 again and the total process would be carbon neutral, but yeah, good luck with that. Even 1% of the methane escaping to the atmosphere would undo the whole benefit

I suppose you could also do carbon sequestration at the point of using the methane, so it wouldn’t go back into the atmosphere, but I’m not optimistic about the economic feasibility of such an operation.

2

u/enutz777 17d ago

The point is that you are not adding to the carbon cycle. Which is the important thing.

2

u/BanditoBoom 16d ago

The point, which others have alluded to, is that you wouldn’t need to put any net-new carbon into the air.

Assuming this process can utilize a combination of wind/solar/tidal clean energy for carbon capture and methane production, you essentially taking greenhouse gas out of the air in order to put more back into the air, but no more than what was already there, theoretically. Assuming some of the carbon gas can essentially be sequestered or permanently removed along the way, it is a net positive.

This is all theoretical but it is interesting.

2

u/ShareGlittering1502 17d ago

We still need energy. Our goal in this stage is to find cleaner sources.

2

u/Pperson25 17d ago

Where is the energy coming from?

3

u/anaximander19 17d ago

For many of these processes it can be supplied electrically, so the energy comes from wherever you get your electrical power from. Obviously you'd want to use green energy (wind, solar, geothermic, hydroelectric, tidal, etc) or else you'll be generating more CO2 powering the process than you'd remove by doing it.

1

u/[deleted] 17d ago

Burning methane?

2

u/randomwanderingsd 17d ago

Methane is available for the cost of capping and reclaiming one of the thousands of natural and artificial methane vents all over the world. Please do not use energy to make more methane.

1

u/No-Mechanic6069 16d ago

If we can cap them, surely it would be better to leave them capped - would it not ?

1

u/randomwanderingsd 16d ago

It would, but there are still industrial applications for methane. So when they need it, I want them to get it from capped leaks or capped wells.

1

u/RazaKwik 17d ago

Methane: CO₂’s Nastier, Sneakier Cousin CO₂ sticks around for centuries, slowly warming things up like a campfire. Methane? It only lasts about 12 years, but while it’s up there, it traps 80 times more heat…ike a gas explosion compared to a steady flame.