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TODAY Thursday 29 January 1998 Each weekday. Conn Nugent on what's new in the world, on the site.

 

TODAY IN THE WORLD: Things To Come (2)

Yesterday's column stole from a fascinating interview of Freeman Dyson by Stewart Brand, appearing in the February issue of Wired (the one with James Cameron on the cover). Dyson tells Brand that he believes that over the next 50 years advances in biotechnology will allow rural dwellers around the world to produce fast-growing biomass crops which, in turn, will produce attractively priced, environmentally-benign fuels. Solar energy plus genetic engineering plus easy access to information foments a revival of village life.

Thanks to wide-awake staffers at the W. Alton Jones Foundation, we were also alerted to an article in the January issue of Scientific American which describes another, quite different scenario of how the world could power itself without undue disruption of the atmosphere. The article, by David Schneider, describes recent ideas on converting coal from bane to boon.

The prime greenhouse gas is carbon dioxide, and its release into the atmosphere during the combustion of fossil fuels is what enviros seek to reduce. But what if you could capture the energy embedded in fossil fuels without releasing carbon? Schneider summarizes the proposal of a group of scientists at Utrecht University in the Netherlands to transform what are (elegantly) called integrated coal-gasification combined-cycle power plants. Thus: "Oxygen added to the coal would form an intermediate gas mixture that would then be converted to hydrogen and carbon dioxide at high pressure by reacting it with water vapor. The hydrogen could be burned to generate electricity, and the carbon dioxide could be separated and sequestered underground."

That last part -- about "sequestered underground" -- relies on recent experience that indicates that pumping carbon dioxide into vast subterranean vaults (played-out natural gas fields, for example) might be a feasible and relatively inexpensive way of keeping CO2 out of the atmosphere. For a while, at least.

So nasty coal -- of which the Chinese have lots, remember -- could become the source of sweet hydrogen. No less a figure than Mr. Hydrogen himself, Professor Robert H. Williams at Princeton's Center for Energy and Environmental Studies, thinks it's all pretty plausible. Once a big promoter of hydrogen fuels derived from biomass, Williams now says: "For most of the next century, I think that hydrogen will be produced from carbonaceous feedstocks."

Schneider points out some key barriers -- particularly relating to the cost and safety of sequestering carbon dioxide -- but the overall impression of his article is that, hey, "fossil fuels, if exploited properly, could continue to service society without threatening to change the climate."

Well, there's a shift for you. As the aforementioned Stewart Brand once said, "History proceeds by ironies." But what of Freeman Dyson's villages? What happens to that vision?

Maybe it segues neatly from the Utrecht strategy. After all, Dyson estimates that it would take about 50 years for biotechnology to develop and disseminate its breakthrough fuel plants. And Bob Williams is careful to limit the fossil-fuels-to-hydrogen phase only to "most of the next century." So maybe we're glimpsing the beginnings of an age where Chinese and American and Australian and Russian coal supplant Mideastern petroleum, and then beyond to a farther age where savvy country folk power the world. It could be rough in the meantime.

 

TODAY ON THE SITE

For a review of Websites pertinent to the whole Big Question of energy and the environment, have a look into Victoria Chanse's recommendations in our High Fives section. Victoria works with the Energy Foundation in San Francisco, and knows what she's talking about.

 

Recent "Today" columns:

1/28: Things To Come
1/27: 'Bye, 'Bye Brazil
1/26: Jaywalking and Jaydriving
1/23: Good Biotech, Bad Biotech
1/22: No More Roads
1/21: Swordfish
1/20: Electromagnetic Sleuthing
1/16: Good News Way Down Under
1/15: Twenty-Four Forty or Fight!
1/14: Your Tax Dollars at Work
1/13: Johnny Mobil Appleseed
1/12: Superbowl, Scientific Uncertainty, and the Future of Al Gore
1/9: Goodbye, Delaware
1/8: Leaf Blowers, Old Cars, Class Conflict
1/7: The Great Improvement That Didn't
1/6: Proactive, Shmoactive
1/5: Mediocre Landscapes and Hope for the Planet
1/2: The Greatest Environmental Cause of the Year
12/31/97: The Top Twelve Environment Stories of 1997

To access more "Today" columns, click "Archives" below.