Carbon recycling innovation makes 100% CO2 Into Ethylene conversion possible

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For more than a decade, researchers from multiple institutions have been looking into how to turn carbon dioxide into ethylene. However, the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) team’s method is the first to use nearly all of the carbon dioxide to make hydrocarbons. This comes as a major breakthrough for environmental sustainability as it opens the doors to converting carbon dioxide from industrial exhaust turned into ethylene, a key component of plastics.

 

Through this process, up to 6 metric tons of carbon dioxide can be turned into 1 metric ton of ethylene, and almost all of the carbon dioxide that is captured can be used again. Since these processes use electricity as their energy source, the process can be carbon negative if renewable energy is used.

 

Thus, Singh says that his team’s method is “net loss” as it goes beyond the net-zero-carbon goal of other carbon capture and conversion technologies because it reduces the total amount of carbon dioxide that the industry puts out. “For every ton of ethylene you make, you take out 6 tons of CO2 from point sources that would have been otherwise released into the air.”

 

In the past, researchers have tried to turn carbon dioxide into ethylene by using reactors that produce ethylene from carbon dioxide emissions. 

 

Most ethylene is made through a process called steam cracking, which needs a lot of heat. This process produces about 1.5 metric tons of carbon emissions for every ton of ethylene made. Every year, manufacturers produce an average of 160 million tons of ethylene, which causes more than 260 million tons of carbon dioxide to be released into the air.

 

These methods allow only about 10% of the CO2 emissions to change into ethylene which was later required to be separated from the carbon dioxide. This process consumed a lot of energy and was often powered by fossil fuels.

 

It is noteworthy that ethylene is the third most carbon-emitting chemical produced after ammonia and cement. It is used to make chemicals that are used to make antifreeze, medical sterilizers, and vinyl siding for houses. It is also used to make plastic products for the packaging, agriculture, and automotive industry.

 

In the UIC method for converting CO2 into ethylene, electric current is passed through a cell that contains carbon dioxide and water-based solution in a 50:50 ratio. An electric catalyst pulls charged hydrogen atoms from water molecules into the other half of the unit, which is separated by a membrane. There, they form a chemical bond with charged carbon atoms from carbon dioxide molecules to produce ethylene.

 

With their electrolysis method, the UIC scientists were able to achieve a very high conversion rate for solar energy; 10% of the energy from the solar panels went straight into making carbon products which are 5X the current standards.

This innovation can open doors to carbon emission reduction in many areas, such as ammonia, cement, electricity generation, and other sources that have a combination of high energy density and CO2. 

 

Also, scientists may be able to produce light petroleum gasses like methane, propane, and butane as well as liquid alcohols using the UIC method. 

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