Thermal depolymerization

Thermal depolymerization (TDP) is a depolymerization process using hydrous pyrolysis for the reduction of complex organic materials (usually waste products of various sorts, often biomass and plastic) into light crude oil. It mimics the natural geological processes thought to be involved in the production of fossil fuels.

I remember reading about this for the first time several years ago on the Parapundit blog.  It was about processing turkey waste into a high quality biofuel.  That post yesterday, of Andrea Fossi doing something similar in Europe reminded me of this post.

It occurred to me several weeks ago that you could use fossil fuels as a source of hydrogen for fuel cells.  This was already demonstrated by the Chrysler NeCar close to 10 years ago.  This car had an onboard methanol reformer, which produced the hydrogen for the fuel cell.  Inasmuch as internal combustion engines are so inefficient as compared to the fuel cell, it would seem that the use of this biofuel as a hydrogen source would be a better choice.

Now, you wouldn't necessarily want to put the reformer on the car.  Instead, put the reformer at the refueling station and let the motorist refill with hydrogen there.  No need for a big infrastructure investment.  The only hurdle remaining would be to get the hydrogen fuel cell prices down to a level that would be economically competitive.

I kept reading further and came across algal fuel.  I read up on that too several years ago.  At the time, the cost per gallon for algal fuel was over 20 dollars per gallon.  It seems that the price has come down.  In any event, the use of the reformers could work here as well.  You may even be able to collect the co2 and resuse it for the next batch of biofuel.

For the discussion about fuel cells, check out the post labeled 'Clean green driving machines'.  Incidentally, one of the reasons for space advocacy is to mine asteroids (or the Moon!) for platinum for use in the fuel cells.