|
|
|
|
|
|
by wmnwmn
2935 days ago
|
|
|
Very simple question that the article completely failed to address: does the process output more energy in the form of gasoline than it takes in? I am quite certain that the answer is, NO, which means that the factory ends up putting more CO2 into the atmosphere than it is taking out...unless the factory itself runs on renewable energy, in which case who needs it at all. |
|
|
Let's say a person swallows poisons. The poison is going to kill them if it stays inside them with the amount that they swallowed. They absolutely need to vomit or they are going to die. The way your comment is approaching this, you're basically saying that vomiting isn't worthwhile because it takes more energy than it gives back.
In this analogy, taking carbon out of the atmosphere is like vomiting up a poison. If we extend the metaphor a little bit, then using renewable is like eating normal food. So if we take the way your comment is approaching things in an analogous way, you're also implying that vomiting up poisons is pointless if the energy we used to vomit was acquired from healthy food.
The metaphor does start breaking down eventually, but its a lot more obvious why this matters when you realize it isn't whether a question of whether we need to vomit - its just a question of how we do it and what we gain from doing it. This method gives us a carbon-neutral fuel, which is valuable. It's also somewhat cheap. There are other ways to remove CO2 from the atmosphere that don't have those upsides.