Great news for classic car owners - synthetic fuel

general_piffle

general_piffle

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This is fascinating to watch, and really gave me a boost today. To think that the life of our classics might not only be prolonged but we'd be helping the environment as well. I love the approach that environmentally friendly transportation doesn't have to be one thing (EVs), or another, it can be a mixture:

 
Very interesting. I'd like to understand better the energy economics of its production. Making this must be endothermic reaction, requiring not insignificant energy.
 
montravia said:
Very interesting. I'd like to understand better the energy economics of its production. Making this must be endothermic reaction, requiring not insignificant energy.
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I watched something on the subject a few months ago. The process of combining the captured carbon with other imgredients to make a fuel by electrolosis requires a lot of energy. They can only claim it is carbon neutral provided the electricty used is from solar or wind farms.

Sunny middle east countries being prime locations for future production sites as they have the right climate / sun hours per year and available land space to aid more cost effective production.

Hopefully when the Porsche production site ramps up production this year then the costs per litre will start to fall and it will become a viable option.

The Porsche production factility will be producing all their fuel for their race teams on the video i watched.
 
The problem with this for me is the basis on which its "green". Its the same train of thought that has given us E10 petrol. The idea is if the plants that are used to make the fuel absorbed the Co2 recently then if we burn it this balances out the effect of burning it. It assumes that the problem with carbon fuels is just the fact that the CO2 trapped in oil taken from underground was trapped millions of years ago and we are releasing it now. It avoids the problem that we are generating way too much CO2 for all the earths natural processed to balance it out (apparently). So by clearing some trees and planting bio fuel plants which we harvest for this e-fuel we are removing a big chunk of the natural COs absorbtion, so if we didn't make bio or synthetic fuel we would have more natural CO2 absorbtion and also less CO2 generated, so its not really green its just designed to make us feel less guilty and make a buck out of a serious crisis. I want to drive my 3200 for ever but I am not going to pretend it nots killing the environment, burning carbon based fuel is a problem and its does not matter where it comes from.
 
davy83 said:
The problem with this for me is the basis on which its "green". Its the same train of thought that has given us E10 petrol. The idea is if the plants that are used to make the fuel absorbed the Co2 recently then if we burn it this balances out the effect of burning it. It assumes that the problem with carbon fuels is just the fact that the CO2 trapped in oil taken from underground was trapped millions of years ago and we are releasing it now. It avoids the problem that we are generating way too much CO2 for all the earths natural processed to balance it out (apparently). So by clearing some trees and planting bio fuel plants which we harvest for this e-fuel we are removing a big chunk of the natural COs absorbtion, so if we didn't make bio or synthetic fuel we would have more natural CO2 absorbtion and also less CO2 generated, so its not really green its just designed to make us feel less guilty and make a buck out of a serious crisis. I want to drive my 3200 for ever but I am not going to pretend it nots killing the environment, burning carbon based fuel is a problem and its does not matter where it comes from.
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If you haven't watched the video already, some of these points are addressed.
 
^ I can imagine the classic car journalist in this instance wanted to appeal to as broad an audience as possible. I see what you're indirectly saying with not planting bio fuel plants, not harvesting/refining them, and not making synthetic fuel being the 'greenest' of options. However, I also see EVs as being (partly) designed to make us feel less guilty and make (A LOT OF) money for manufacturers.

In some respects, EVs are just another mass-marketing exercise that a lot of people have jumped on as some sort of 'magic bullet' - but they are not. Because the production of EVs and their batteries, the charging network/architecture that needs to be generated, the recycling of batteries at the end of their lifecycle, and other considerations all come with their own environmental impacts.

Ultimately, I do believe that there is more than one solution to redressing the environmental balance and hopefully as research continues more viable choices will become available. I'm just not a fan of a 'one size fits all' mentality and believe there's a lot of that going on in the general public where EVs are concerned. My 2p :)
 
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