Brad Lowe wrote:
Scientists at Virginia Tech are working on a breakthrough
energy technology to convert plant sugars to hydrogen with efficiencies >
100%.
http://scienceblog.com/62111/game-changer-in-alternatve-energy/
This could further evidence of an alarming trend in Sci-News these days.
You can call it U-hype - University hyperbole in the extreme. Universities
need funding and PR helps to get it.
Think about the unsaid part of this story - from the cynic's POV
The good: Xylose is a main building block for cellulose, so one does not
need to use food grain to get it but...
The bad: Most common trees like pine are at most 10% xylose and even then it
is not easy to extract.
The real bad: xylose (HOCH2(CH(OH))3CHO) is composed of hydrogen at a mass
percentage of about 7%.
The ugly: You cut down a 1000 pound tree and you get only 7 pounds of
hydrogen, at most. What happens to the other 993 pounds ? Yup, it does have
burnable carbon, doesn't it, so do you waste that or not?
Oops... business as usual.
Wouldn't we be far better off using wind energy to split water to get the
hydrogen - and not have to burn the 993 pounds of waste timber to get the 7
pounds of hydrogen ?
Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist.
-George Carlin
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