26 Dec 2021, 10:37 am
26 Dec 2021, 11:31 am
Axeman wrote:
Mountain Goat wrote:
True but that is assuming that we have no future use for oil.
It is a bit like having an excess in discarded glass. One can grind it back into sand, or one can recycle it as glass.
While we have a continual need for glass, we may as well recycle it rather than grind it back into sand.
It is a bit like having an excess in discarded glass. One can grind it back into sand, or one can recycle it as glass.
While we have a continual need for glass, we may as well recycle it rather than grind it back into sand.
Glass is different because the material itself is not toxic or an environmental hazard. It's also impossible to degrade by biology and almost impossible to degrade chemically.
Prehaps you need to look at the engineering principles behind the refining process, and learn about the principles of what was known as town gas and how they could recycle it with a skilled opertor up to ten times and the wast material (Coke) was then used in power stations and as a household fuel to provide heat. The process was not that polluting as every part of the process was used as much as it could be.
Pollution comes where the fuel is not used effectively or efficiently. Plastic is not pollution. It is litter. There is a big difference between the two because it is in its solid state. Convert it into its liquid of gas state and one has pollution as it can mix with liquid or gas and cause problems.
The picture of a fish caught in plastic... The plastic is not polluting the fish (The fish may die if the plastic pulls it onto the shore and its gills fail to work in air, but that is due to the plastic acting as a litter, not as a pollutant).
Going back to the refining process. Crude oil is heated in a sealed container (Those very tall towers) and the process is quite a simple one. The crude oil separates due to the heat into either a sludge that we use as grease, an oil like engine oil and diesel etc, then lighter oils and petrol, and then at the top of the process, a gas comes out which we call LPG. At the top of the tower, as more gas is used then there is a commercial market for, it is burned for two reasons. The first is to protect the enviroment as if it was not burned, pure LPG will head into the atmosphere (In this way the refining process is actually more enviromentally friendly then leaving the gas come out naturally from the ground), and secondly for the safety of those in the area as LPG is highly flammable. (People who do not have a clue how things work have called for these flames to be put out but if they did that that is what will cause an excess of pollution as the flame itself is part of the process of keeping things enviromently friendly. Is a shame the flames are so high up as we could cook our sausages on there!
Now the process of making gas from coal is in a way similar. Today it is rarely done as we tap directly into natural gas pockets, but in the past, a skilled operator can obtain gas from the same coal up to ten times and the remains which were then known as coke can be further burned as a form of smokeless fuel for use in powerstations and other industrial settings as well as for home use, but the principle is that when one heats up wood or coal etc it produces gas, and so if one heats up the fuel in a container, the gas given from it can be used as a source of fuel. It is a far more efficient and enviromentally friendly way then simply sticking coal on a fire as a fuel. Those Victorians knew what they were doing!
Now instead of heating up coal we heat up plastic, not only are we re-refining it and can obtain the same process as if we were heating up crude oil, we are also recycling the products entirely into more useful forms, so we can re-use them again and thus we have saved ourselves from obtaining more crude oil.
As each refined fuel has a use from the grease and tar at the bottom of the process to the gas that comes out of the top of the process, the only real form of poluttion (If we have a use for the gas... Once the process starts we can use the gas to continue heating the plastic) is the burning of a fuel to form heat if we heat the container containing the plastic in that way.
LGP is the gas. Below that is the petrol. Below that is diesel and the oils and below that is the grease and tar, all of which have a practical use.
26 Dec 2021, 11:51 am
26 Dec 2021, 12:02 pm
Mountain Goat wrote:
Axeman wrote:
Mountain Goat wrote:
True but that is assuming that we have no future use for oil.
It is a bit like having an excess in discarded glass. One can grind it back into sand, or one can recycle it as glass.
While we have a continual need for glass, we may as well recycle it rather than grind it back into sand.
It is a bit like having an excess in discarded glass. One can grind it back into sand, or one can recycle it as glass.
While we have a continual need for glass, we may as well recycle it rather than grind it back into sand.
Glass is different because the material itself is not toxic or an environmental hazard. It's also impossible to degrade by biology and almost impossible to degrade chemically.
Prehaps you need to look at the engineering principles behind the refining process, and learn about the principles of what was known as town gas and how they could recycle it with a skilled opertor up to ten times and the wast material (Coke) was then used in power stations and as a household fuel to provide heat. The process was not that polluting as every part of the process was used as much as it could be.
Pollution comes where the fuel is not used effectively or efficiently. Plastic is not pollution. It is litter. There is a big difference between the two because it is in its solid state. Convert it into its liquid of gas state and one has pollution as it can mix with liquid or gas and cause problems.
The picture of a fish caught in plastic... The plastic is not polluting the fish (The fish may die if the plastic pulls it onto the shore and its gills fail to work in air, but that is due to the plastic acting as a litter, not as a pollutant).
Going back to the refining process. Crude oil is heated in a sealed container (Those very tall towers) and the process is quite a simple one. The crude oil separates due to the heat into either a sludge that we use as grease, an oil like engine oil and diesel etc, then lighter oils and petrol, and then at the top of the process, a gas comes out which we call LPG. At the top of the tower, as more gas is used then there is a commercial market for, it is burned for two reasons. The first is to protect the enviroment as if it was not burned, pure LPG will head into the atmosphere (In this way the refining process is actually more enviromentally friendly then leaving the gas come out naturally from the ground), and secondly for the safety of those in the area as LPG is highly flammable. (People who do not have a clue how things work have called for these flames to be put out but if they did that that is what will cause an excess of pollution as the flame itself is part of the process of keeping things enviromently friendly. Is a shame the flames are so high up as we could cook our sausages on there!
Now the process of making gas from coal is in a way similar. Today it is rarely done as we tap directly into natural gas pockets, but in the past, a skilled operator can obtain gas from the same coal up to ten times and the remains which were then known as coke can be further burned as a form of smokeless fuel for use in powerstations and other industrial settings as well as for home use, but the principle is that when one heats up wood or coal etc it produces gas, and so if one heats up the fuel in a container, the gas given from it can be used as a source of fuel. It is a far more efficient and enviromentally friendly way then simply sticking coal on a fire as a fuel. Those Victorians knew what they were doing!
Now instead of heating up coal we heat up plastic, not only are we re-refining it and can obtain the same process as if we were heating up crude oil, we are also recycling the products entirely into more useful forms, so we can re-use them again and thus we have saved ourselves from obtaining more crude oil.
As each refined fuel has a use from the grease and tar at the bottom of the process to the gas that comes out of the top of the process, the only real form of poluttion (If we have a use for the gas... Once the process starts we can use the gas to continue heating the plastic) is the burning of a fuel to form heat if we heat the container containing the plastic in that way.
LGP is the gas. Below that is the petrol. Below that is diesel and the oils and below that is the grease and tar, all of which have a practical use.
I'm interested in using bacteria to do this because it could be used on the mountains of plastic trash in the oceans too. Imagine a Pseudomonas strain genetically modified for ocean growth with plastic degrading enzymes on high copy number plasmids. Bacteria could provide a cheap self replicating solution.
What you propose sounds like a toxic mess.
