Seawater is salty,
undrinkable,
and a potential source of planet-saving fuel.
Hold up. Fuel?
Yeah, that’s right.
We have the technology
to convert seawater into liquid fuel.
You’re up in the air,
staring down at the beautiful ocean below.
It’s your first carbon neutral flight
and you couldn’t be more excited.
Sure, the tickets were a little more expensive.
But jet-setting without the environmental cost
of carbon emission is well worth it.
You think about how amazing it is
that the very ocean below you
is the same thing powering
this large commercial jet.
But how did we get here?
In 2014, the United States Navy
successfully created liquid hydrocarbon fuel
from seawater.
They did this by extracting carbon dioxide
and hydrogen gas from seawater
and using a relatively cheap catalyst to convert
carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide.
And just in case I lost you there,
a catalyst is a chemical that lowers
the amount of energy needed
for another chemical reaction to happen.
After this chemical reaction is complete,
the carbon monoxide is transformed into fuel.
The U.S. Navy was able to generate
4 liters (0.88 gallons) a day in the pilot program.
Scaled up,
this seawater technology could
completely replace fossil fuels,
which would be a big deal.
Not only that,
but because this seawater fuel is liquid,
it could be used in existing cars and airplanes.
With transportation being responsible for 14% of all greenhouse gas emissions,
developing this alternative fuel source
would help us eliminate almost
100,000,000,000 metric tons (100 gigatons)
of carbon dioxide from our atmosphere by the year 2050.
The immediate cost would be
more expensive than oil,
but if we don’t cut our
greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030,
severe storms, droughts, and famine await.
And it's probably much better to spend
a little more upfront
to avoid such a mess.
There are three big advantages
to this alternative fuel source.
First,
the resource is abundant.
Since 70% of our planet is covered by ocean,
we already have a lot of seawater ready to go.
Second,
most modern day objects
already use liquid fuels,
so it would be an easy conversion.
And third,
liquid fuels are easier to transport compared to gas.
If you put this new seawater fuel
into your current car,
you wouldn’t notice any difference.
It would look and smell the same.
You would still be emitting carbon dioxide
into the atmosphere when you drove around.
But because you are only emitting
the exact amount of carbon dioxide
that was extracted from the seawater initially,
it's a carbon neutral fuel source.
Of course,
it would only be truly carbon neutral
if the whole process was also carbon neutral.
From building the liquid storage tanks,
to pumping water,
and creating the catalyst,
it would all have to release zero carbon dioxide,
which means we would still need to
supplement this process with wind or solar energy.
This method of creating liquid fuel
is still early in the developmental process.
Even so,
it’s important to support new technology
being created to replace our current,
harmful fossil fuel consumption.
Raise your voice and encourage
a cleaner and greener future.
We need to push our governments
to move forward responsibly and invest in
technology and practices
that could save our planet.
Maybe we could raise money for green tech
by charging corporations for any pollution
they inflict on our environment.
But that’s a story for another What IF.