Scientists Turn CO2 into Solid Coal

A team of scientists used liquid metal and a liquid electrolyte to convert gaseous CO2 into a solid, coal-like substance, a breakthrough that could change the ways carbon is removed from the atmosphere and permanently stored.

Coal. Photo: Nostrifikator/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

It's one of several recently developed negative emissions techniques that seek to make carbon capture and storage cheaper, safer and more efficient. This particular method was developed by a research team led by RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, and it uses a liquid metal electrocatalyst, containing nanoparticles of the rare-earth metal cerium, to convert the greenhouse gas into a stable, coal-like solid.

To date, CO2 has only been converted into a solid at extremely high temperatures, making it industrially unviable.

By using liquid metals as a catalyst, it's possible to turn the gas back into carbon at room temperature, in a process that's efficient and scalable.

Instead of being buried underground, the solid carbon produced by the method could be used as a fuel source or as feedstock, as the element is in other carbon utilization approaches.

A side benefit of the process is that the carbon can hold electrical charge, becoming a supercapacitor, so it could potentially be used as a component in future vehicles. The process also produces synthetic fuel as a by-product, which could also have industrial applications.

The ability to sell or otherwise use carbon after removing it from the atmosphere would help make carbon capture and storage methods more cost-effective, and therefore more scalable.

Currently, only about 1 percent of carbon emissions are removed from the atmosphere and stored. Making it cheaper to do so could help the global community remove the 100 billion to 1 trillion tons of carbon necessary to avoid catastrophic global warming by mid-century. (Tasnim News Agency)

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