View Full Version : Bananas to replace petroleum based plastics?
momoese
07-23-2013, 03:23 PM
Science in Action Winner for 2013: Elif Bilgin | @ScientificAmerican, Scientific American Blog Network (http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/at-scientific-american/2013/06/27/science-in-action-winner-for-2013-elif-bilgin/)
Olafhenny
07-23-2013, 05:01 PM
I do not see anything groundbreaking in this. Plastics are basically all carbon/hydrogen
compounds, as are pretty well all fuels. Accordingly using bio-matter to produce plastics is
in the same vane as using it to produce fuels. For industrial purposes oil is much more readily
available, the conversion processes are tried and in place and will be hard to alter considering
that bio-mass is already in short supply for fuel production.
Much more promising is fusion energy, which will make much of the carbon based energy sources
obsolete and leave oils and bio-matter free for such uses as producing plastics and carbon fibers.
There are many fusion protocols in the research stage. The most advanced being probably
General Fusion's.
See: General Fusion (http://generalfusion.com/) We should know more about the feasibility of this sometime next year.
Omaha_Banana
07-23-2013, 05:34 PM
Being from Nebraska, I prefer the plastics made from corn.
I don't know what the fuss is about, it seems petroleum is a renewable energy source anyway.
Fracturing the Fossil Fuel Fable (http://principia-scientific.org/14-editor-s-favorites/134-fracturing-the-fossil-fuel-fable.html)
Olafhenny
07-23-2013, 09:38 PM
Hi Brod,
while that article contains some facts, it also includes a lot of balderdash. Coal is definitely
created by covered and decomposed fossils. You can often see the shapes of plants which
formed its base clearly imprinted in pieces of coal.
The fact, that new technologies like fracking or tar sand recovery technologies have opened
new stores of carbon based fuels, does not mean, that they are not finite. I have always
wondered about the origin of oil, but even if it is geological, it is still available only in limited
deposits, as witnessed by the fact, that the production of oil recoverable by conventional
methods has already peaked.
The fact is that all fossil fuels are messy. A good, feasible fusion technology, if achieved,
could do a lot to clean up the environment. I am particularly enthralled by the concept
pursued by General Fusion, because the result would be small, contained reactors (no radioactive
material would ever leave the plant and tritium has only a half life of 12.5 years),
which would serve a population of about 25,000 (100 MW capacity). They could be locally
placed in small communities (like today's substations) and on large ships, making large overland
transmission lines obsolete.
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