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Showing posts with label Synthetic natural gas (SNG). Show all posts
Showing posts with label Synthetic natural gas (SNG). Show all posts

Tuesday, August 27, 2019

The real solution to Carbon problem

The real solution for Carbon problem:
When mother nature buried Carbon under the ground by way of fossil, we human beings mined them at enormous cost and added further value by combustion with air converting it into CO2 (carbon dioxide). In fact, we human beings added enormous value to carbon that remained buried (with zero value) for millennia. We were interested in the heat of combustion but forgotten about the CO2 emission. This is the fundamental flaw in the commercialization of thermal power using fossil fuels. Now there is a price to pay. There are only 2 options to overcome this problem.
1    We can completely ignore and ban fossil fuel all together at enormous cost (we have already invested in trillions in mining, processing, transporting and storing) and seek completely a new solution without any Carbon at all. This is unlikely to happen.
2      We can continue to use fossil fuel and generate base load power as we have been doing for decades but capture CO2 and convert it back into fuel so that it can be recycled with Zero CO2 emission. This is certainly feasible.
Many “so called innovators” are suggesting alternatives to fossil power generation using renewable source of energy. These sources were available with us from the beginning of the world as we know it, but they are intermittent. We are used to 24

x7 base load power using fossil fuels.
The real solution lies in using intermittent renewable energy to generate base load power (24 x 7) with zero Carbon emission. Renewable Hydrogen can achieve this goal. In doing so battery can also play a small role but not a major role. Couple of things should happen to achieve this goal.
1.     Capturing CO2 at the lowest cost. It can be best achieved using Oxy combustion of fossil fuel such as LNG (because it is a purified form of natural gas) using Brayton cycle with 100 % CO2 capture.
2.     Generate renewable Hydrogen (RH) using electrolysis using renewable energy source such as solar and wind etc. Technology is well proven and commercially available.
3.     Convert captured CO2 into CH4 using methanation reaction (which is already commercially practised) and recycling CH4 as a fuel to continue the base load power generation as usual. The newly generated CH4 becomes a renewable natural gas (RNG) by substituting fossil Hydrogen with renewable Hydrogen (RH). This technology developed by CEWT is known as Carbon Recycling Technology (CRT). It is a perfect example of a circular economy. Governments around the world should scrap fossil subsidies, tax Carbon @ $100.Mt ( at least) and offer liberal subsidies to renewable energy so that the cost of renewable hydrogen (RH) is at the lowest. CRT will allow Carbon to remain below ground as nature has done for several years. CRT will allow to run base load power (24 x 7) using RNG with ZERO CARBON EMISSION.

The above process is the only economical, commercial and environmental solution to the problem of global warming and climate change. All other methods will be expensive, time consuming with no guaranteed results and are unlikely to happen in the shortest time we have.
We at CEWT have the solution (not just theoretical but practically and commercially implementable immediately) and we seek like-minded partners and investors to team up with us so that we can show case the technology and implement them worldwide.








Tuesday, April 29, 2014

“Petrol from seawater “, a Carbon neutral fuel to mitigate climate change !


Recent news from USA has got the attention of many people around the world. “Scientists with the United States Navy say they have successfully developed a way to convert seawater into jet fuel, calling it a potentially revolutionary advancement. Researchers at the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) developed technology to extract carbon dioxide from seawater while simultaneously producing hydrogen, and then converted the gasses into hydrocarbon liquid fuel. The system could potentially shave hours off the at-sea refueling process and eliminate time spent away from missions.” They estimate the cost of the jet fuel will be anywhere between $3 and $6 per gallon. It may not be able to compete with traditional petroleum sources due to high energy requirement. However, the main attraction of this process is to extract Carbon dioxide absorbed by the ocean to avoid acidification and to mitigate climate change while making petrol as a Carbon neutral fuel. Ocean has become a rich source of Carbon (Carbon sink) absorbing excess atmospheric Carbon dioxide caused by human beings. Generating Carbon neutral fuel such as SNG (synthetic natural gas), diesel and petrol from air and sea water will be the fastest way to reduce Carbon from the atmosphere. Probably Governments, business and industries will embarrass this concept much quicker than any other mitigating methods simply because it is a revenue generating proposition with a potential to earn carbon credit. Carbon-neutral fuel is a synthetic fuel (including methane, gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel or ammonia) that is produced using carbon dioxide recycled from power plant flue exhaust gas or derived from carbonic acid in seawater and renewable Hydrogen. Such fuels are potentially carbon-neutral because they do not result in a net increase in atmospheric greenhouse gases. It is a Carbon capture and recycling (CCR) process. “To the extent that carbon-neutral fuels displace fossil fuels, or if they are produced from waste carbon or seawater carbonic acid, and their combustion is subject to carbon capture at the flue or exhaust pipe, they result in negative carbon dioxide emission and net carbon dioxide removal from the atmosphere, and thus constitute a form of greenhouse gas remediation. Such power to gas carbon-neutral and carbon-negative fuels can be produced by the electrolysis of water to make hydrogen used in the Sabatier reaction to produce methane which may then be stored to be burned later in power plants as synthetic natural gas, transported by pipeline, truck, or tanker ship, or be used in gas to liquids processes such as the Fischer–Tropsch (FT) process to make traditional fuels for transportation or heating. Carbon-neutral fuels are used in Germany and Iceland for distributed storage of renewable energy, minimizing problems of wind and solar intermittency, and enabling transmission of wind, water, and solar power through existing natural gas pipelines. Such renewable fuels could alleviate the costs and dependency issues of imported fossil fuels without requiring either electrification of the vehicle fleet or conversion to hydrogen or other fuels, enabling continued compatible and affordable vehicles. A 250 kilowatt synthetic methane plant has been built in Germany and it is being scaled up to 10 megawatts.” (Wikipedia). We have been writing about renewable hydrogen (RH) for the past couple of years and often use the phrase, “Water and energy are two sides of the same coin” because we can mitigate climate change using renewable hydrogen (RH) even while the fossil fuel economy can carry on as usual. By generating Carbon neutral fuels using excess Carbon from air and sea and hydrogen from water (even seawater) using renewable energy sources, the problem of global warming and climate change can be solved because we will not be adding any further Carbon into the atmosphere than what it is today! Instead of generating solar and wind power and storing them in batteries it will be prudent to generate Carbon neutral fuel from CO2 already available in the system and use them as usual. Meanwhile Hydrogen based power generation and transportation can be developed as a long term solution. Fossil- fuel fired power plants produce CO2 (Carbon dioxide) which could be captured and converted to CO (Carbon monoxide) for production of synthetic fuels. CO2 can be converted to CO by the Reverse Water Gas Shift Reaction, CO2 + H2--> CO + H2O. CO could then be used in the F-T reaction with additional hydrogen from water-splitting to produce synthetic fuel such as diesel and petrol as carbon neutral fuels. Synthetic fuel by CO2 Capture + H2 from Water-splitting: Reverse Water Gas Shift CO2 + H2 ----> CO + H2O F-T reaction CO + 2H2 ----> CH2 + H2O Water-splitting 3H2O + Energy --> 3H2 + 3/2O2 Net reaction CO2 + H2O + Energy ---> CH2 + 3/2O2 In this case, no coal is needed at all, and CO2 is consumed rather than produced. The excess O2 (oxygen) would be used in the fossil power plant that provides the CO2, simplifying CO2 capture. There is currently considerable effort underway on developing CO2 capture systems for new and extant power plants. The increasing concern with Global Climate Change suggests that there is a reasonable likelihood of such plants operating in the timeframe associated with synthetic fuel from carbon dioxide. Such a synergistic system has the potential to significantly reduce our current emissions of CO2 since the carbon in the coal is used once for power production and then again for liquid hydrocarbon fuel synthesis. Synthetic fuel plant with capacities as low as 1000 barrels/day are commercially feasible using specially designed micro-reactors as shown in the attached photograph.(Ref:velocys system). Utilizing carbon dioxide from sea and air is the smartest way to mitigate climate change while maintaining fossil fuel based power plants and automobiles without any change or modifications. The same technique can also be applied for biomass gasification plants.

Friday, January 3, 2014

Coal may be the Problem and the Solution too!


Can renewable energy really stop GHG emissions and global warming? Renewable energy is slowly but steadily becoming a choice of energy of the people due to its potential to reduce GHG emissions and global warming. The changing weather pattern around the world in recent times are testimony for such a warming globe. Can renewable energy really reduce the GHG emissions and reduce the global warming predicted by scientists? Thousands of large coal- fired power plants are already under implementation or planning stages. According to World’s resources institute, their key findings are : 1. According to IEA estimates, global coal consumption reached 7,238 million tonnes in 2010. China accounted for 46 percent of consumption, followed by the United States (13 percent), and India (9 percent). 2. According to WRI’s estimates, 1,199 new coal-fired plants, with a total installed capacity of 1,401,278 megawatts (MW), are being proposed globally. These projects are spread across 59 countries. China and India together account for 76 percent of the proposed new coal power capacities. 3. New coal-fired plants have been proposed in 10 developing countries: Cambodia, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Laos, Morocco, Namibia, Oman, Senegal, Sri Lanka, and Uzbekistan. Currently, there is limited or no capacity for domestic coal production in any of these countries. 4. Our analysis found that 483 power companies have proposed new coal-fired plants. With 66 proposed projects, Huaneng (Chinese) has proposed the most, followed by Guodian (Chinese), and NTPC (Indian). 5. The “Big Five” Chinese power companies (Datang, Huaneng, Guodian, Huadian, and China Power Investment) are the world’s biggest coal-fired power producers, and are among the top developers of proposed new coal-fired plants. 6. State-owned power companies play a dominant role in proposing new coal-fired plant projects in China, Turkey, Indonesia, Vietnam, South Africa, Czech Republic and many other countries. 7. Chinese, German, and Indian power companies are notably increasingly active in transnational coal-fired project development. 8. According to IEA estimates, the global coal trade rose by 13.4 percent in 2010, reaching 1,083 million tonnes. 9. The demands of the global coal trade have shifted from the Atlantic market (driven by Germany, the United Kingdom, France and the United States) to the Pacific market (driven by Japan, China, South Korea, India and Taiwan). In response to this trend, many new infrastructure development projects have been proposed. 10. Motivated by the growing Pacific market, Australia is proposing to increase new mine and new port capacity up to 900 million tonnes per annum (Mtpa) — three times its current coal export capacity. The above statistics is a clear indication that GHG emissions by these new coal-fired power plants will increase substantially. A rough estimation indicates that these new plants will emit Carbon dioxide at the rate of 1.37 mil tons of CO2/hr or 9.90 billion tons of CO2 /yr in addition to the existing 36.31 Gigatons/yr (36.31 billion tons/yr) in 2009. (According to CO2now.org). If this is true, the total CO2 emissions will double in less than 4 years. If the capacity of new PV solar plants are also increased substantially then the CO2 emissions from PV solar plants will also contribute additionally to the above. There is no way the CO2 reduction to the 2002 level can be achieved and the world will be clearly heading for disastrous consequences due to climate change. The best option to reduce GHG emissions while meeting the increasing power demand around the world will be to recycle the Carbon emissions in the form of a Hydrocarbon with the help of Hydrogen. The cheapest source of Hydrogen is coal. The world has no better option than gasifying the coal instead of combusting the coal. Capturing Carbon and recycling it as a fuel : Solar power, wind power and other renewable energies generated 6.5% of the world’s power in 2012. This is part of a rising trend , but there is a very long way to go before renewable sources generate as much energy as coal and other fossil fuels. Solar panel of 1m2 size requires 2.4kg of high grade silica and Coke and it consumes 1050 Kwh of electricity, mostly generated by fossil fuel based power plants. But 1m2 solar panel can generate only 150kwh/yr and it will require at least 7 years to generate the power used to produce 1m2 solar panel in the first place. More solar panels mean more electricity consumption and more GREEN HOUSE GAS EMISSIONS.A large quantity of CO2 will have to be emitted into the atmosphere for the production of several GW (Giga- watts) of solar power.With thousands of newly planned and implemented coal fired power plants in the near future the greenhouse gas emission is likely to go up. It could take at least thirty years before renewable energy is as strong in the marketplace as non-renewable sources. In consequence, there is a need to use fossil fuels more effectively and less detrimentally until the renewables can play a major role in global energy production. One approach tried for more than a decade has been carbon capture, which stops polluting materials getting into the atmosphere; however subsequent storage of the collected materials can make this process expensive. Now an Australian based company has gone one step further and designed a process that not only collects CO2 emissions, but also turns it into a fuel by using the same coal! Clean Energy and Water Technologies has developed an innovative solution to avoid carbon emissions from power plants. The novel approach uses coal to capture carbon dioxide emissions (CO2 ) from coal-fired power plants and convert them into synthetic natural gas (SNG). Synthetic natural gas would then replace coal as a fuel for further power generation and the cycle would continue. No coal is required for further power generation. Through this method, the captured Carbon could be recycled again and again in the form of a Hydrocarbon fuel (SNG) with no harmful gas emissions. Carbon is an asset and not a liability. If Carbon is simply burnt away just to generate heat and power then it is a bad science, because the same Carbon can be used to generate several products by simply recycling it instead of venting out into the atmosphere. Carbon is the backbone of all valuable products we use every day from plastics to life saving drugs! As well as seeking a patent for this breakthrough innovation, Clean Energy and Water Technologies is seeking investment for a demonstration plant. Once demonstrated, it would then be possible to retrofit current coal-fired power stations with the new technology, increasing their economic sustainability and reducing their impact on the environment. 1. The Economic Pressures : Power is an integral part of human civilization. With the steady increase in human population and industrialization the demands for energy and clean water has reached unprecedented levels. The gap between the demand and supply is steadily pushing the cost of power and water higher, whilst the supply of coal, oil and gas is dwindling. The prospect of climate change has compounded problems. Many countries around the world have started to use renewable energy such as solar, wind, hydro and geo-thermal power; but emerging economies such as India and China are unable to meet their demands without using fossil fuels. At present, it is far cheaper to use the existing infrastructures associated with non-renewable energy, such as coal-fired power stations. Renewable energy sources are intermittent in nature and require large storage and large initial investment, with sophisticated technologies pushing the cost of investment higher. Governments could use environmental tariffs on power use to help make renewable energy more competitive, but politicians know that the public tend to not like such an approach. 2. Demonstration Plant: The estimated investment required for a demonstration plant is likely to be $10 million; however the potential for a good return on investment is high, as shown by the following estimation for a 100MW plant. • A 100MW coal-fired power plant will emit 98 Mt/hr CO2 • Coal consumption will be about 54Mt/hr • To convert 98Mt/hr CO2 into SNG, the plant needs to generate 390,000m3/hr syngas by coal gasification. • The gasification plant will require 336 Mt/hr coal and 371 m3/hr water. • The net water requirement will be : 95.70m3/hr • The SNG generated by the above plant will be : 95,700m3/hr and steam as by-product : 115Mt/hr. • Potentially SNG can generate a gross power of 500 MWS by a Gas turbine with combined cycle operation. • The plant can generate 500MW (five times more than the coal-fired plant) from CO2 emissions. • Existing 100MW coal fired power plant can use SNG in place of coal and sell the surplus SNG to consumers. • Surplus SNG will be about 75,000 m3/hr.( 2400 mm Btu/hr) with sale value of $36,000/hr. @ $15/mmBtu. • Annual sales revenue from sale of surplus SNG will be : $ 300 mil/yr. • The entire cost of coal gasification and SNG plant can be recovered back in less than 5 years. 3. Carbon Capture and Storage : Carbon capture and storage is the process of capturing waste carbon dioxide (CO2 ) from large point sources, such as fossil fuel power plants, transporting it to a storage site, and depositing it where it will not enter the atmosphere, normally an underground geological formation. The aim is to prevent the release of large quantities of CO2 into the atmosphere. It is a potential means of mitigating the contribution of fossil fuel emissions to global warming and ocean acidification. The long term storage of CO2 is a relatively new concept. The first commercial example was Wey burn in 2000. Carbon capture and storage applied to a modern conventional power plant could reduce CO2 emissions to the atmosphere by approximately 80–90%, but may increase the fuel needs of a coal-fired plant by 25–40%. These and other system costs are estimated to increase the cost of the energy produced by 21–91% for purpose built plants. Applying the technology to existing plants could be even more expensive. 4. Global Warming : Global warming is the rise in the average temperature of Earth's atmosphere and oceans since the late 19th century and its projected continuation. Since the early 20th century, Earth's mean surface temperature has increased by about 0.8 °C (1.4 °F), with about two-thirds of the increase occurring since 1980. Scientists are more than 90% certain that it is primarily caused by increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases produced by human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels by coal-fired power plants. 5. Greenhouse Gases Without the earth's atmosphere the temperature across almost the entire surface of the earth would be below freezing. The major greenhouse gases are water vapour, which causes about 36–70% of the greenhouse effect; carbon dioxide (CO2 ), which causes 9–26%; methane (CH4), which causes 4–9%; and ozone (O3), which causes 3–7%. According to work published in 2007, the concentrations of CO2 and methane have increased by 36% and 148% respectively since 1750. These levels are much higher than at any time during the last 800,000 years, the period for which reliable data has been extracted from ice cores. 6. The Future of Global Warming?: Climate model projections were summarized in the 2007 Fourth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). They indicated that during the 21st century the global surface temperature is likely to rise a further 1.1 to 2.9 °C (2 to 5.2 °F) for their lowest emissions scenario and 2.4 to 6.4 °C (4.3 to 11.5 °F) for their highest. 7. The Impact of Global Warming? : Future climate change and associated impacts will vary from region to region around the globe. The effects of an increase in global temperature include a rise in sea levels and a change in the amount and pattern of precipitation, as well a probable expansion of subtropical deserts. Warming is expected to be strongest in the Arctic and would be associated with the continuing retreat of glaciers, permafrost and sea ice. Other likely effects of the warming include a more frequent occurrence of extreme weather events including heat waves, droughts and heavy rainfall, ocean acidification and species extinctions due to shifting temperature regimes. There is a divided opinion among scientists on climate science. Major power consuming countries like the US, Europe, Japan and Australia are reluctant to sign the Kyoto Protocol and agree to a legally binding agreement. This has resulted in non-cooperation among the nations and the world is divided on this issue. Such disagreement has hampered development of non-renewable energy. Ahilan Raman is the inventor of the innovative process mentioned in the article. If you have any further questions or like to become a part of this innovative technology, please feel free to contact him directly by writing to this blog.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

How to control Carbon emissions in coal-fired power plants?


“Over two-thirds of today’s proven reserves of fossil fuels need to still be in the ground in 2050 in order to prevent catastrophic levels of climate change” – a warning by scientists. There is a great deal of debate on climate change due to man-made Carbon emissions and how to control it without any further escalation. The first obvious option will be to completely stop the usage of fossil fuel with immediate effect. But it is practically not feasible unless there is an alternative Non-Carbon fuel readily available to substitute fossil fuels. The second option will be to capture carbon emission and bury them under ground by CCS (Carbon capture and sequestration) method. But this concept is still not proven commercially and there are still currently many uncertainties with this technology, the cost involved and environmental implications etc.The third option will be not to use fresh fossil fuel for combustion or capture and bury the Carbon emissions but convert the Carbon emissions into a synthetic hydrocarbon fuel such as synthetic natural gas (SNG) and recycle them. By this way the level of existing Carbon emission can be maintained at current levels without any further escalation. At least the Carbon emission levels can be reduced substantially and maintained at lower levels to mitigate climate changes. It is technically feasible to implement the third option but it has to be implemented with great urgency. One way of converting Carbon emission is to capture and purify them using conventional methods and then react with Hydrogen to produce synthetic natural gas (SNG) CO2 + 4 H2 ----------> CH4 + 2 H2O The same process will be used by NASA to eliminate carbon built-up in the flights by crew members during their long voyage into the space and also to survive in places like Mars where the atmosphere is predominantly carbon dioxide. But we need Hydrogen which is renewable so that the above process can be sustained in the future .Currently the cost of Hydrogen production using renewal energy sources are expensive due to high initial investment and the large energy consumption. We have now developed a new process to generate syngas using simple coal, which is predominantly Hydrogen to be used as a Carbon sink to convert Carbon emissions into synthetic natural gas (SNG). The same Hydrogen rich syngas can be directly used to generate power using gas turbine in a simple or combined cycle mode. The Carbon emission from the gas turbine can be converted into SNG (synthetic natural gas) using surplus Hydrogen-rich syngas. The SNG thus produced can be distributed for CHP (combined heat and power) applications so that the Carbon emission can be controlled or distributed. By implementing the above process one should be able to maintain Carbon at specific level in the atmosphere. Existing coal fired power plants can retrofit this technology so that they will be able to reduce their Carbon emissions substantially; they can also produce SNG as a by-product using their Carbon emissions and achieve zero Carbon emission at their site while generating revenue by sale of SNG. Coal is the cheapest and widely used fossil fuel for power generation all over the world. Therefore it will be a win situation for everyone to use coal and also to reduce Carbon emissions that can address the problems of climate change. Meanwhile research is going on to generate renewable Hydrogen cheaply directly from water using various technologies. But we believe we are still far away from achieving this goal and we require immediate solution to address our climate change problems. Recently BASF made a press release :www.basf.com/group/pressrelease/P-13-351‎ claiming a break-through technology to generate Hydrogen from natural gas without any CO2 emissions.

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

How to put “Carbon genie” back into the bottle?

The Carbon emission in the atmosphere is steadily increasing. The latest statistics indicates that it has reached a staggering 35.6 billion tons/yr, a 2.6% increase over the previous year, thanks to the growth of China. It is becoming evident that there is a relationship between the Carbon emission, global warming and erratic weather patterns around the world. According to ‘The Guardian’, “The chances of the world holding temperature rise to 2C – the level of global warming considered "safe" by scientists – appear to be fading fast with US scientists reporting the second-greatest annual rise in CO2emissions in 2012. Carbon dioxide levels measured at Mauna Loa observatory in Hawaii jumped by 2.67 parts per million (ppm) in 2012 to 395ppm, said Pieter Tans, who leads the greenhouse gas measurement team for the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The record was an increase of 2.93ppm in 1998. The jump comes as a study published in Science on Thursday looking at global surface temperatures for the past 1,500 years warned that "recent warming is unprecedented", prompting UN climate chief, Christiana Figures, to say that "staggering global temps show urgent need to act. Rapid climate change must be countered with accelerated action." Tans told the Associated Press the major factor was an increase in fossil fuel use. "It's just a testament to human influence being dominant", he said. "The prospects of keeping climate change below that [two-degree goal] are fading away. Preliminary data for February 2013 show CO2 levels last month standing at their highest ever recorded at Manua Loa, a remote volcano in the Pacific. Last month they reached a record 396.80ppm with a jump of 3.26ppm parts per million between February 2012 and 2013. Carbon dioxide levels fluctuate seasonally, with the highest levels usually observed in April. Last year the highest level at Mauna Loa was measured at 396.18ppm. What is disturbing scientists is the acceleration of CO2concentrations in the atmosphere, which are occurring in spite of attempts by governments to restrain fossil fuel emissions. According to the observatory, the average annual rate of increase for the past 10 years has been 2.07ppm – more than double the increase in the 1960s. The average increase in CO2 levels between 1959 to the present was 1.49ppm per year. The Mauna Loa measurements coincide with a new peer-reviewed study of the pledges made by countries to reduce CO2 emissions. The Dutch government's scientific advisers show that rich countries will have to reduce emissions by 50% percent below 1990 levels by 2020 if there is to be even a medium chance of limiting warming to 2C, thus preventing some of climate change's worst impacts."The challenge we already knew was great is even more difficult", said Kelly Levin, a researcher with the World Resources Institute in Washington. "But even with an increased level of reductions necessary, it shows that a 2° goal is still attainable – if we act ambitiously and immediately." Extreme weather, which is predicted by climate scientists to occur more frequently as the atmosphere warms and CO2 levels rise, has already been seen widely in 2013. China and India have experienced their coldest winter in decades and Australia has seen a four-month long heat wave with 123 weather records broken during what scientists are calling it 'angry summer'. "We are in [getting] into new climatic territory. And when you get records being broken at that scale, you can start to see a shifting from one climate system to another. So the climate has in one sense actually changed and we are now entering a new series of climatic conditions that we just haven't seen before", said Tim Flannery, head of the Australian government's climate change commission, this week. Earlier this week the Met Office warned that the "extreme" patterns of flood and drought experienced by Britain in 2012 were likely to become more frequent. One in every five days in 2012 saw flooding but one in four days were in drought”. The biggest question now is how to put this Carbon genie back into the bottle? Renewble energy may be an answer to curtail future Carbon emissions but what about the existing coal fired power plants that constitutes 60% of the existing power generation in the world? There is no easy solution. But the “Law of conservation of mass” gives us a clue.The Carbon we dig from the earth in the form of coal, combusted into the atmosphere as Carbon dioxide may be captured and recycled back into the system in the form of a fuel.By this way, we may not require fresh coal to be mined.To achive this feat,we need Hydrogen from a renewable source.The renewable Hydrogen can be combined with Carbon dioxide caputured from the coal fired power plants to generate synthetic natural gas (SNG).The SNG generated by this method can be used for future power generation, substituting Coal and future carbon emission can be recycled in the form of SNG. This approach will open up a wide range of possibilities and potentially reduce the carbon emission to zero. Many companies round the world including DOE (Department of energy,Govt of USA) are trying to develop an economically viable method to generate Hydrogen with an estimated cost of poduction at $ 2.50 /kg of Hydrogen. One potential method is to generate Hydrogen by splitting water using a thermo-chemical process using concentrated solar therml energy developed by European Union called “Hydrosol cycle”. The method by which Hydrogen is generated should be free from any Carbon emision. To clean up 1 Kg Carbon dioxide one will require at least 0.2kg Hydrogen. For example, a 100Mw coal fired power plant emitting about 2256 Mt CO2/day will require about 451 Mt of Hydrogen/day, costing about $1,127,500 per day.It will cost roughly $500/Mt of C02 to put the ‘ Carbon genie’ back into the bottle! One can imagein the cost of cleaning up 35.6 billion tons of Carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.Only a Carbon free Hydrogen derived from water can save the world from a potential catastrophe.