After an hour, the chemical reaction creates the red powder that’s key to turning carbon dioxide into fuel (Image credit: University of Waterloo)
Climate change is a serious problem that continues to get worse. We’re constantly look for ways to fight back against pollution and ways to promote renewable energy. One team of scientists from the University of Waterloo is fighting back with their newly created “artificial leaf,” which inexpensively changes harmful carbon dioxide (CO2) into a useful alternative fuel.
The artificial leaf, outlined in the journal Nature Energy, was inspired by the way plants get energy from the sun and turn carbon dioxide into food. “We call it an artificial leaf because it mimics real leaves and the process of photosynthesis,” said Yimin Wu, an engineering professor at the University of Waterloo who led the research. “A leaf produces glucose and oxygen. We produce methanol and oxygen.”
So how exactly does this process work? A big factor is cuprous oxide, a cheap red powder that is chemically engineered to have as many eight-sided particles as possible. This is created by a chemical reaction when glucose, copper acetate, sodium hydroxide, and sodium dodecyl sulfate are added to water heated to a specific temperature. After this, the powder is added to water, where it acts as the catalyst as carbon dioxide is filtered in, and a solar simulator shines white light into the solution.
The result creates oxygen gas, and the carbon dioxide, water, and powder solution are converted into methanol. Because methanol has a lower boiling point than water, the solution is headed, and the methanol is collected as it evaporates.
Similar research is being conducted at the University of Cambridge in the UK. Researchers there have created a device that uses photosynthesis produced by sunlight and cobalt light-absorbers that turn water and carbon dioxide gas into syngas. It’s also similar to the “artificial tree” concept by Klaus Lackner, director of the Lenfest Center for Sustainable Energy at Columbia University.
As for the Waterloo team, they’ll continue their research on the artificial leaf as well as increasing the methanol yield and commercializing the patented process to convert carbon dioxide collected from major greenhouse gas sources such as power plants, vehicles and oil drilling.
“Climate change is an urgent problem,” said Wu. “We can help reduce CO2 emissions while also creating an alternative fuel.”
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