Could you soon be filling up with SEAWATER? US Navy reveals 'game changing' fuel created from water



Has flown radio controlled plane using 'sea fuel' in first test of new fuel

New technique can capture 92% of CO2 in water to create jet fuel



Could be used to create fuel for any vehicle without having to modify engines



The US Navy has developed a radical new fuel made from seawater.

They say it could change the way we produce fuel - and allow warships to stay at sea for years at a time.



Navy scientists have spent several years developing the process to take seawater and use it as fuel, and have now used the 'game changing' fuel to power a radio controlled plane in the first test.

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The water jet fuel: Flying a radio-controlled replica of the historic WWII P-51 Mustang red-tail aircraft (l to r) Dr. Jeffrey Baldwin, Dr. Dennis Hardy, Dr. Heather Willauer, and Dr. David Drab (crouched), successfully demonstrate a novel liquid hydrocarbon fuel to power the aircraft's unmodified two-stroke internal combustion engine. The test provides proof-of-concept for an NRL developed process to extract carbon dioxide (CO2) and produce hydrogen gas (H2) from seawater, subsequently catalytically converting the CO2 and H2 into fuel by a gas-to-liquids process.

The development of a liquid hydrocarbon fuel is being hailed as 'a game-changer' because it would allow warships to remain at sea for far longer.

The US has a fleet of 15 military oil tankers, and only aircraft carriers and some submarines are equipped with nuclear propulsion.

All other vessels must frequently abandon their mission for a few hours to navigate in parallel with the tanker, a delicate operation, especially in bad weather.



The ultimate goal is to eventually get away from the dependence on oil altogether, which would also mean the navy is no longer hostage to potential shortages of oil or fluctuations in its cost.

The predicted cost of jet fuel using these technologies is in the range of $3-$6 per gallon, and with sufficient funding and partnerships, this approach could be commercially viable within the next seven to ten years.



Pursuing remote land-based options would be the first step towards a future sea-based solution, the Navy says.

The power plant that can turn water in jet fuel: Researchers hope to make the system portable enough to fit on a warship to produce enough fuel for the ship and the planes it carries

Vice Admiral Philip Cullom declared: 'It's a huge milestone for us.

'We are in very challenging times where we really do have to think in pretty innovative ways to look at how we create energy, how we value energy and how we consume it.



'We need to challenge the results of the assumptions that are the result of the last six decades of constant access to cheap, unlimited amounts of fuel,' added Cullom.



'Basically, we've treated energy like air, something that's always there and that we don't worry about too much.



'But the reality is that we do have to worry about it.'



HOW TO MAKE JET FUEL FROM WATER

A beaker of fuel(right) made from seawater by scientists at the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) in Washington, DC The NRL process begins by extracting carbon dioxide and hydrogen from seawater.

As seawater passes through a sepcially built cell, it is subjected to a small electric current.

This causes the seawater to exchange hydrogen ions produced at the anode with sodium ions.

As a result, the seawater is acidified. Meanwhile, at the cathode, the water is reduced to hydrogen gas and sodium hydroxide is formed.

The end product is hydrogen and carbon dioxide gas, and the sodium hydroxide is added to the leftover seawater to neutralize its acidity. In the next step, the hydrogen and carbon dioxide are passed into a heated reaction chamber with an iron catalyst.

The gases combine and form long-chained unsaturated hydrocarbons with methane as a by-product.

The unsaturated hydrocarbons are then made to form longer hydrocarbon molecules containing six to nine carbon atoms.

Using a nickel-supported catalyst, these are then converted into jet fuel.

They hope the fuel will not only be able to power ships, but also planes.



The predicted cost of jet fuel using the technology is in the range of three to six dollars per gallon, say experts at the US Naval Research Laboratory, who have already flown a model airplane with fuel produced from seawater.



Dr Heather Willauer, an research chemist who has spent nearly a decade on the project, said:



'For the first time we've been able to develop a technology to get CO2 and hydrogen from seawater simultaneously, that's a big breakthrough,' she said, adding that the fuel 'doesn't look or smell very different.'



Now that they have demonstrated it can work, the next step is to produce it in industrial quantities.

But before that, in partnership with several universities, the experts want to improve the amount of CO2 and hydrogen they can capture.

Dr. Heather Willauer explains how scientists at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, DC can make fuel from seawater

'We've demonstrated the feasibility, we want to improve the process efficiency,' explained Willauer.



Collum is just as excited.



'For us in the military, in the Navy, we have some pretty unusual and different kinds of challenges,' he said.



'We don't necessarily go to a gas station to get our fuel, our gas station comes to us in terms of an oiler, a replenishment ship.



'Developing a game-changing technology like this, seawater to fuel, really is something that reinvents a lot of the way we can do business when you think about logistics, readiness.'



A crucial benefit, says Collum, is that the fuel can be used in the same engines already fitted in ships and aircraft.



'If you don't want to re-engineer every ship, every type of engine, every aircraft, that's why we need what we call drop-in replacement fuels that look, smell and essentially are the same as any kind of petroleum-based fuels.'

