e-fuel, synthetic fuel, bio-fuel still alive?

[bobins]

Germany had quite a history of synthetic fuel production during the years 1939-45.......

[NewcastleFalcon]

Bit more about Porsches little Chilean Adventure from the horse's newsroom when they kicked the project off
https://newsroom.porsche.com/en/2020/co ... 23021.html
The recipe.

Chile, with its excellent climate conditions for wind power and the associated low cost of electricity, has a very high potential in international terms for producing, exporting and locally using green hydrogen. To generate green hydrogen, electrolysers use wind power to dissociate water into its two components: oxygen and hydrogen. In a second step, plans call for filtering CO2 out of the air and then combining it with the green hydrogen to form synthetic methanol. The result is renewable methanol, which can be converted into climate-friendly fuel using an MTG (methanol to gasoline) technology to be licensed and supported by ExxonMobil.

Doesn't it fill you with confidence is that the biggest dinosaur of them all Exxon Mobil is involved at the last stage...

The alternative, the NF personal view

Don't bother with any of that, link wind power generation of electricity with the Electricity grid, and grid scale battery storage. Plug your electric vehicle in and use the power direct.

Didn't get much of a reception in FCF circles but the all electric Porsche Taycan is going to be a big seller for Porsche, and for those who like performance, (although where on earth can you genuinely use that performance, other than speeding around a race track) electric wins hands down over anything the Porsche ICE designers will ever come up with, and whatever synthesised fuel they wish to burn. Of course the noise wont be the same...boo hoo!
Instead of synthesising fuel maybe they should synthesise noise....er the technology for that has already arrived

Regards Neil

[Gibbo2286]

Without the financial input from the established oil giants Neil I doubt if any of the alternative energy technology would have got off the ground.

[NewcastleFalcon]

Not hydrogen fuel cell vehicles still alive. but, Hydrogen Internal Combustion Engines still alive..... ,

Well they are with Toyota as this recently released 17 second video testifies.



Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Avid viewers and contributors to the Hydrogen Thread will be familiar with the Green Blue and various Shades of grey hydrogen.

Now in the "liquid Fuel" arena the phrase "Blue Gasoline" and "Blue Diesel" is being used. Not a 100% e-fuel just a bit more renewables content than E10, 33% apparently.

Two very opposing views of e-fuels

E-fools: why e-fuels in cars make no economic or environmental sense
From the lobby group Transport & Environment.

Bosch, Shell, and Volkswagen develop renewable gasoline with 20 percent lower CO? emissions Bosch Media Service 03/05/2021

Sale of Blue Gasoline also planned at regular filling stations (Germany I presume) in the course of the year
Blue Gasoline fuel contains up to 33 percent renewables.
Shell will offset remaining carbon emissions through certified offset arrangements.
The fuel complies with the EN 228/E10 standard and can be used in all gasoline engines.
Bosch is replacing regular gasoline with Blue Gasoline at company filling stations.

Chew over it at your leisure. I always expected this sort of development to happen.

REgards Neil

[white exec]

Hydrogen?
" Members of the global Hydrogen Council include Saudi Aramco, BP and Total, and some critics say hydrogen provides a “cover story for fossil fuels”. "

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... ssil-fuels

[NewcastleFalcon]

I saw that report covered by some of the mainstream media as well as the more "electric centric" sites.
Liquid e-fuels go a few steps beyond the inefficiency of using electricity to make Hydrogen, with a further synthesis to produce a liquid e-fuel.

There are a large number of influential companies putting investment into e-fuels and however inefficient and illogical, its going to play some role.

Here's Siemens dabbling.
I'll put the link on the Hydrogen Thread as e-H₂ is the primary building block for the rest. (and who will supply the feedstock Well the eco version would be "green Hydrogen" from renewables, but there ain't going to be enough of that so step forward blue and grey, and step forward oil and gas.)

Mobility: Power-to-X produces synthetic fuels for immediate application: e-Methane, e-Methanol, e-Diesel, e-Gasoline or e-Jet fuel – ready for instant use. They can be blended gradually with fossil fuels until they fully replace fossil fuels as a primary energy source.
Existing infrastructure such as gas pipelines, gas stations, or storage facilities can be used as well as existing and low-cost consumer applications, powered by e-Fuels.

Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Here is your E10 Petrol on its way to a forecourt near you.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/e10-petrol-explained

....and the magic ingredient 10% "Ethanol from Renewable Sources", but is it 10% or "up to 10%" as was the case with E5 being classed as between 0% and 5% ethanol.

Not sure where the UK and the EU's 10 percents of E10 are coming from, but over in the USA a fair chunk comes from growing corn.

This article claims up to 40% of the USA Corn crop is being grown to convert into Ethanol, for such blends with petrol. Bumps up the price of corn as a food stuff, and ethanol producers are incentivised to use corn as a feedstock to produce ethanol as they are part of the multi billion dollar US renewable Credits Market.

Tesla prepares to disrupt ethanol producers by entering renewable fuel credit market


Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

E10
....and the magic ingredient 10% "Ethanol from Renewable Sources", but is it 10% or "up to 10%" as was the case with E5 being classed as between 0% and 5% ethanol.

Not sure where the UK and the EU's 10 percents of E10 are coming from,

Lets see what is easily found out.

https://www.e10info.eu/faq/

Is the ethanol sold in Europe also made in Europe
The vast majority of ethanol sold in Europe is made in Europe.
(relax its that very specific proportion "vast majority").

What is ethanol made of
Ethanol is made from sustainably grown crops, wastes and residues.
(so that means anything a farmer can grow even food crops)

now a big question,with a big answer

Will using ethanol increase food prices
Production of ethanol has almost no impact on food prices, according to publicly available data. In fact, even as EU biofuels production has increased, global food prices fluctuated more in line with oil prices. In its annual renewable energy progress reports, the European Commission confirms that EU biofuels policy has not led to negative impacts on food prices.
(Oops I think the FAQ answers are running into BS territory here)

and just to add a touch of humour one of the Frequently Asked questions (really?) was this

What is E10 not related to
The fuel type is not related to several other uses of the terms E10, including:

The motorway in Northern Sweden and Norway
The German type of locomotive
The Dutch road sign
European long-distance path from Bolzano in Italy to Nuorgam in Finland (quite a hike…)

[NewcastleFalcon]

In Europe, ethanol is normally produced from agricultural sources such wheat, maize, barley, rye, triticale, and sugar beets

https://www.epure.org/about-ethanol/wha ... e-ethanol/

https://www.epure.org/about-ethanol/what-is-renewable-ethanol/

Regards Neil

[myglaren]

A far better use of ethanol

[NewcastleFalcon]

Took a bit of finding, but on page 94 of 196 of Annex 1 to the draft European Commission Delegated Act on climate-related objectives, this little phrase appears...

Food-and feed crops are not used for the manufacture of biofuels for use in transport and for the manufacture of bioliquids.

The European ethanol and biofuel lobby want the phrase eliminated. Recently there has been an increase in imports of Ethanol to the EU from Brazil the USA and Canada. Wonder how much policing goes on of the non-food or feed crop source of the E put into the E10?

https://ec.europa.eu/finance/docs/level-2-measures/taxonomy-regulation-delegated-act-2021-2800-annex-1_en.pdf

Regards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

https://www.twelve.co/ejet

Every so often e-fuels pop up.

Here's one with a USAF investment

Is the first fossil-free jet fuel made from CO2 viable?

Basically electroysis of water and carbon dioxide to produce syn-gas CO plus H₂, which is then refined into jet fuel.

Fairly convoluted, energy intense, and inefficient process which at the end out pops the CO₂ when it is combusted. So even if it is sucked out of the air the initially, it returns from whence it came. Carbon neutral-ish?

Big advantage though....its jet fuel in liquid form, just synthetic, and more expensive, no change to airport or infrastructure or aircraft fuel systems, plenty of those little tankers beavering about distributing it.

Regards Neil

[GiveMeABreak]

Well anyone who has seen the latest McDonalds adverts, popping off about their green creds will have heard them harping on about sending all their frying oil off for bio diesel.....

..... though personally, I think they are shipping it down to the KFC as the last lot of 'fries' we had were brown, greasy and disgusting.

[mickthemaverick]

Nothing new about McDonalds using their used oil for the delivery fleet. They were doing that when I was running my Delica on cooking oil as I approached our branch and asked them about their used oil and they told me it all goes back to the depot to make biodiesel for the delivery fleet. That was in 2010!!