[ExI] Sandia and energy

[BillK]

On 12/19/09, Keith Henson wrote:
>  Bill, for basic science reasons that's nonsense.
>
>  It would take more energy than a power station is making to convert
>  the CO2 it puts out into liquid fuel.  So a coal plant would have to
>  be surrounded by square miles of solar collectors.
>
>  It's only when you have solved and oversolved the energy source
>  problem that making liquid fuels from CO2 makes sense.  The energy
>  source is what's important, not the well understood chemistry of
>  making liquid fuels.
>
>

You didn't read their press release, did you?

They are not using miles of solar collectors. They intend to use
parabolic dishes to make a solar furnace to get the thermal energy
required.
But this is only a proof of concept plant at present.

That's why they estimate 10-15 years to improve efficiency and for the
price of oil to increase and greater need to extract CO2 from the
atmosphere.

BillK