Greenhouse Gas Solution?

Two people submitted stories about this article, so I am going to post them together.

See: http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/Issues/2011/February/RehabilitatingCapturedCO2.asp

Instead of burying CO2  underground, scientists are coming up with new ways of converting the CO2 into useful products and chemical intermediates. Even though it is pretty hard to make CO2  react, new processes are being developed to convert it into polymer feedstocks, carbonate salts and biofuels. Bayer MaterialScience's Christoph Gurtler, for example, says that it could be feasible to make CO2 react into polyether polycarbonate polyols given the right catalyst and technical set-up. Moreover, biofuel companies such as Phycal(Ohio) are using plants and algae to make useful products, benefiting from the fact that plants and algae produce complex molecules from CO2. The whole purpose of "recycling" CO2 is to reduce its emissions to the atmosphere, therefore preventing climate change. This is exactly why I found this article interesting - because climate change is one of the most problematic issues that currently exists. Consequently, discovering new ways and solutions to overcome this issue that concerns the entire human race is very important for a better future.
Posted by Mikaela Freundlich

For the general public, there has recently been an emphasis on the reduction of waste and carbon emissions. The key greenhouse gas, and arguably the most important chemical on the planet today due to its reaction profile is CO2. In contrast to other atmospheric gases, CO2 has long been known for its general stability and lack of reactivity so although the capture and storage of the CO2 has presented itself as a promising solution, there has been a prevalent question of how to deal with the carbon dioxide once it is collected. This radical question has finally merited some promising solutions. A project in Germany known as Dream Production has a goal of producing polyols from CO2. A polyol is an alcohol containing multiple hydroxyl groups and in terms of polymer chemistry, polyols can be used as reactants to make other polymers, which are key components of many useful synthetics and other materials. A perfect example of a potential use of captured CO2 is that polyurethane foam based on carbon dioxide can be made into insulation to reduce future emissions from daily life. Although chemists struggle to get carbon dioxide to react, the chemical’s involvement in a plant’s ability to produce oxygen as a byproduct of cellular respiration proves that there must be a feasible mechanism for humans to scientifically replicate the process. The recycling of CO2 presents an incredibly promising solution to the increasingly detrimental greenhouse gas issue but the economic feasibility of many of the projects done thus far have yet to be determined.
Posted by Emily Edwards