New Fuels: Part 2
Fuels from Ice, Water, and Sunshine
HIGHLIGHTS
ombating disease … providing clean water and safe food … developing new
sources of energy … confronting climate change. Hello from Washington,
D.C. This is Global Challenges — a special podcast from ACS, whose 160,000
members make up the world’s largest scientific society. Today’s headlines are a drumbeat of
dilemmas that affect the everyday lives of people everywhere. Global Challenges takes you
behind those headlines for eye-opening glimpses of how chemistry is responding to those
challenges — improving and sometimes saving people’s lives. You’ll hear the stories and
meet the scientists whose discoveries are helping to make life longer, healthier, and happier for millions of people. Today’s global challenge in this ongoing saga of chemistry for
life: Providing cleaner, cheaper, and sustainable sources of fuel to meet our growing energy
needs — gas hydrates, solar energy, hydrogen, nuclear power, and the continuing quest for
conventional oil resources.
◆ Discovering an economical way to
“mine” gas hydrates
would yield a bonanza
of new natural gas
— at least 100 times
more than exists in all
known resources of
conventional natural
gas.
The Ice that Burns
Step onto the deck of a scientific research vessel in the Atlantic Ocean off the East Coast of
the United States. Special gear hauls up chunks of ice the size of softballs from beneath the
ocean floor. Lying on the ship’s deck in the open air, those chunks of ice come alive. The
chunks sizzle and pop like bacon in a hot frying pan. Left alone, they just sputter away, disappearing into little puddles of water. But put a lighted match next to a chunk of ice. And it
catches fire. This is no ordinary ice. This is “the ice that burns.” These are gas hydrates, one
of the most exotic of a suite of new fuels that may help meet the world’s energy needs in the
21st century.
In the first episode of this two-part podcast on new fuels, we focused on biofuels. These
renewable fuels are made from plants. They include the familiar ethanol that is produced
from corn in the United States and added to gasoline. Biofuels are liquid fuels that supplement gasoline and diesel to power cars and trucks. But transportation accounts for only
one-third of the energy consumed in the United States every year.
The rest goes to other purposes. Producing electricity, for example, to light, heat, and cool
homes, stores, and other buildings. Coal and natural gas now supply most of that energy. We
need new fuels to join them. New fuels suitable for a world concerned about sustainability,
global warming, and minimizing releases of carbon dioxide.
◆ Scientists are making
key advances in producing less-expensive
and more-efficient
solar cells that produce electricity from
the sun.
◆ Motorists someday
may “fill ’er up”
with water, fueling
cars and trucks from
self-contained solar
energy systems that
use sunlight to break
water into hydrogen
and oxygen.
PHOTO COURTESY OF J. PINKSTON AND L. STERN/U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY
◆ Nuclear fuel already
provides 20 percent
of electricity in the
United States and
advances in technology may boost its
importance.
Icy Energy Bonanza
That’s why gas hydrates are generating a buzz. Gas hydrates form when methane gas from
decomposition of organic material comes into contact with water at low temperatures and
DiD YOU KNOW?
Natural gas is odorless but suppliers add a chemical compound called mercaptan to
give it an odor so that people can detect leaks.
The sun is a gigantic nuclear fusion reactor that by some estimates produces enough
energy in barely a minute to supply the world for one year.
We measure energy with British thermal units (BTUs). One BTU is about equal to the
energy released as a wooden match burns.
Energy conservation by turning a room thermostat down just 1 degree Fahrenheit this
winter will save about 3 percent of the energy needed to heat the room.
◆ Many other new
sources of energy
are on the horizon,
including expanded
use of thermoelectric
technology devices
that directly convert
electricity into thermal energy for cooling or heating.
