Carbon Capture Technology - ARPA-E Seeks Breakthrough
Carbon Capture Technology - ARPA-E Seeks Breakthrough
Every second, our bodies capture carbon dioxide in our tissues, transport it via the blood, and dump it in the lungs from where it is exhaled. This unconscious process is yet another way humans contribute to the accumulation of the greenhouse gas in the atmosphere—albeit in a minuscule volume compared with burning fossil fuels. The key to this metabolic process is an enzyme called carbonic anhydrase and it's efficiency at capturing and releasing CO2 is what human engineers want to mimic at the power plant scale.
Research engineer Harry Cordatos and his colleagues at United Technologies Corp. (UTC) are working on just such a system—and have garnered funding from the U.S. Department of Energy's new ARPA-E program. After all, UTC subsidiary Hamilton Sundstrand has been making CO2 capture units for the space program since the 1960s with different technology. But carbonic anhydrase "captures 600 molecules every second," Cordatos said at the ARPA-E summit in Washington, D.C., last week. "To take this enzyme out of the body is challenging. Our bodies continuously regenerate the enzyme because it degrades."
So Cordatos and UTC's idea is not to use the enzyme itself, but to master its chemistry and "use it in the unnatural environment of power plant flue gas," Cordatos said. The key appears to be a single zinc atom that sits at the core of the enzyme, which resembles a pyramid in structure. That structure allows the carbonic anhydrase to grip the CO2 "not too loose and not too tight," Cordatos explained, which is critical for efficiently capturing and then releasing the greenhouse gas.
more
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=smokestash-industry-arpa-e-seeks-carbon-capture-breakthroughs
Every second, our bodies capture carbon dioxide in our tissues, transport it via the blood, and dump it in the lungs from where it is exhaled. This unconscious process is yet another way humans contribute to the accumulation of the greenhouse gas in the atmosphere—albeit in a minuscule volume compared with burning fossil fuels. The key to this metabolic process is an enzyme called carbonic anhydrase and it's efficiency at capturing and releasing CO2 is what human engineers want to mimic at the power plant scale.
Research engineer Harry Cordatos and his colleagues at United Technologies Corp. (UTC) are working on just such a system—and have garnered funding from the U.S. Department of Energy's new ARPA-E program. After all, UTC subsidiary Hamilton Sundstrand has been making CO2 capture units for the space program since the 1960s with different technology. But carbonic anhydrase "captures 600 molecules every second," Cordatos said at the ARPA-E summit in Washington, D.C., last week. "To take this enzyme out of the body is challenging. Our bodies continuously regenerate the enzyme because it degrades."
So Cordatos and UTC's idea is not to use the enzyme itself, but to master its chemistry and "use it in the unnatural environment of power plant flue gas," Cordatos said. The key appears to be a single zinc atom that sits at the core of the enzyme, which resembles a pyramid in structure. That structure allows the carbonic anhydrase to grip the CO2 "not too loose and not too tight," Cordatos explained, which is critical for efficiently capturing and then releasing the greenhouse gas.
more
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=smokestash-industry-arpa-e-seeks-carbon-capture-breakthroughs
Labels: Carbon Capture Technology - ARPA-E Seeks Breakthrough
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