Scientists have always been eyeing a method to produce electricity from natural gas with zero GHG emissions, so that the reliance on the conventional methods involving use of fossil fuels should go down. Accordingly, a bunch of MIT researchers seems to have chanced upon a patented system — a natural-gas electric power plant that uses solid-oxide fuel cells for producing power from fuel and does not require any combustion either.
mit zero emission natural gas combustion
Funded by the BP-MIT Conversion Research Program, Thomas Adams (postdoctoral associate) and Paul I. Barton (the Lammot du Pont Professor of Chemical Engineering) analyzed the performance and relative costs of their system against other existing or proposed generating systems via computer simulations. Truly heartening are their findings that suggest their proposed system as capable of eliminating 100 percent of carbon emissions, and that too, at a comparable cost and higher efficiency for the electricity produced. Instead of hurling any carbon dioxide or other gases, the system would produce a stream of pure carbon dioxide. Afterward, this stream could be stored underground via carbon capture and sequestration (CCS). The fuel-cell-based system produces clean water as a byproduct.
Once done with their researches, the MIT researchers plan to establish a prototype 250-kilowatt plant by 2012.
Via: MIT News
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