[HN Gopher] Launch HN: Remora (YC W21) - Carbon capture for semi...
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Launch HN: Remora (YC W21) - Carbon capture for semi trucks
Hi HN! I'm Paul, one of the co-founders of Remora
(https://remoracarbon.com). Remora is building a device that
captures the carbon emissions from a semi truck. Our device mounts
between the truck and its trailer, attaches to its tailpipes, and
captures at least 80% of its carbon emissions. We will sell the
captured carbon dioxide to concrete producers and other end users,
helping companies earn new revenue while meeting their climate
commitments. We decided to start Remora because we believe
electrification won't work for long-haul trucking. Bill Gates
agrees: "Even with big breakthroughs in battery technology," he
wrote, "electric vehicles will probably never be a practical
solution for things like 18-wheelers" [1]. Before Remora, my co-
founder, Eric, built hydrogen and electric semi trucks. He saw
first hand that these trucks have far less payload capacity and
range, plus the batteries lose > 40% of their range in cold weather
[2]. We also knew that electrification means building a new network
of stations with enough charging capacity for semi trucks,
replacing every truck on the road, and overhauling the grid, which
is still 63% fossil fuels in the US [3]. So we thought: Why can't
we just capture the carbon emissions from the trucks' tailpipes?
Turns out, my co-founder, Christina, spent her entire PhD answering
this question [3]. Mobile carbon capture was first proposed about a
decade ago, but academics dismissed it in favor of stationary
carbon capture for power plants. The problem with stationary
capture, though, is that it takes tens of millions of dollars
upfront to design those systems, and they have to be tailored to a
specific plant--it's impossible to make a cheap, modular unit that
can be manufactured at scale. So Christina became the first person
to test adsorbents (the materials that selectively capture carbon
dioxide) in the specific conditions of diesel exhaust.
Surprisingly, the adsorbent that worked best was a naturally-
occurring mineral that is cheaply available in mass quantities.
Christina built a proof of concept to test in the EPA's National
Vehicle and Fuel Emissions Lab, and it worked. While I was
finishing my senior year at Yale, I read Christina's dissertation
online. I called her up to ask a bunch of questions and we hit it
off. After more conversations, I wrote her a business plan and
convinced her to quit her new job at the EPA to start Remora. Then,
we sent a blurb to every professor at the top 15 engineering
schools, interviewed ~ 50 engineers, and found Eric. Now, we've
completed our first working prototype and we're currently testing
it on our truck. Here's how it works: First, we condition the
truck's exhaust to lower its temperature and humidity, then we run
it through a bed of pellets that selectively captures carbon
dioxide, letting the other gases escape. When the bed is saturated,
we heat the pellets to release the carbon dioxide, which we
compress into a tank inside the device. To ensure continuous
operation, the device includes two beds: while the first is heated,
the truck's exhaust flows through the second; when the second is
saturated, they switch, and so on. This process is very energy
efficient because we're able to use the waste heat from the truck's
exhaust to heat the pellets. Our first units will be capturing
carbon dioxide on customers' trucks by August. By the end of the
year, we'll have 40 units on the road capturing ~ 100 metric tons
of carbon dioxide per week--the equivalent of planting 248,000
trees [5]. We will start by selling this carbon dioxide to concrete
producers and other end users, but as we grow, we will earn tax
credits for permanently sequestering the carbon dioxide deep
underground. Long term, if we pair our technology with biofuels,
we can make a truck carbon negative. We also hope to apply it to
other hard-to-electrify forms of long-haul transportation, like
cargo ships. We're excited to hear your questions, concerns, and
feedback! I'll be responding to comments all day, or please feel
free to shoot me an email at hello@remoracarbon.com. [1]
https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/Moving-around-in-a-zero-ca...
[2] https://apnews.com/article/04029bd1e0a94cd59ff9540a398c12d1
[3] https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3 [4]
https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/1515...
[5] https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2015/03/17/power-one-tree-ve...
Author : paulgross
Score : 186 points
Date : 2021-03-10 16:02 UTC (6 hours ago)
| leoedin wrote:
| When you sell the captured CO2 on, how is it being used? Do the
| concrete producers use it in their concrete somehow? How long
| does it stay there?
|
| Carbon capture only works if we have viable long term solutions
| for the captured carbon dioxide - which isn't the easiest gas to
| get rid of.
| [deleted]
| paulgross wrote:
| Agreed. The concrete producers inject it into their concrete,
| which is widely thought to be one of the most permanent forms
| of CO2 storage in existence. We will only work with end users
| that are using the CO2 in a way that permanently takes it out
| of circulation. Medium term, this will probably mean that we
| sequester a lot of our captured CO2 in depleted oil wells or
| saline aquifers. Long term, we're actually hoping to turn the
| CO2 back into fuel right at the truck stop, so we can put it
| back into the trucks for a circular solution.
| driverdan wrote:
| This is a very interesting idea.
|
| What is the performance impact on the engine?
|
| You said in another reply that it will also capture CO, NOx, and
| SOx. Will this replace any existing emissions equipment such as
| urea injection?
| paulgross wrote:
| The device does not affect the aerodynamics of the truck or the
| power of the truck. It creates essentially no back pressure on
| the engine. In our beta testing, our device currently increases
| back pressure < 0.5 psi, which is nearly negligible. We're
| confident that we'll get this down to essentially 0 psi as we
| continue to test and improve the technology ahead of our
| initial pilots.
|
| Our solution is complimentary with solutions like urea
| injection and diesel exhaust fluid!
| pjerem wrote:
| Ultra stupid-naive question : why could you not store the
| extracted CO2 in the same tank as fuel ? Or maybe CO2 tank volume
| is just not a problem.
| samatman wrote:
| In addition to the sibling answer, CO2 is both a gas at any
| sensible pressure for a diesel tank, and has more molecules
| (and mass) than the constituent fuel.
|
| This adds up to more volume than the original diesel-- a lot
| more. There's no actual efficiency to be gained here,
| especially since trucks are more constrained by mass than by
| volume.
| edoceo wrote:
| Would have to refit those existing tanks and make them pressure
| ready, extra plumbing problems too. Current device sound like a
| simple bolt-on.
| paulgross wrote:
| Exactly. We want this to be as simple as possible for folks
| to add to their existing trucks, so it's easiest for us to
| store the captured CO2 inside our device on the back of the
| cab.
| Mizza wrote:
| I'm glad that people are pursuing end-of-pipe solutions as well.
| For a long time (at least by my understanding), they've been
| considered verboten by environmental groups, but I think there
| are all sorts of sensible uses cases.
|
| Good luck to you!
| paulgross wrote:
| Thanks so much!
| pstuart wrote:
| It seems that a bonus feature would be cleaner exhaust -- at
| least for diesel particulates go.
| paulgross wrote:
| Exactly!
| SamBam wrote:
| The site says you're funded, in part, by LowerCarbon Capital [1]
|
| This is right in my interests -- investing directly in companies
| trying to combat climate change. Does anyone know much about
| them? I'm considering dropping them a line and seeing if I can
| invest in the fund as well.
|
| 1. https://lowercarboncapital.com/
| paulgross wrote:
| Lowercarbon Capital is amazing! You should definitely drop them
| a line.
| simonebrunozzi wrote:
| Look up lowercase capital and Chris Sacca. You will find plenty
| of information about them. Mostly positive, but not all
| positive.
| twobitshifter wrote:
| What's the market size for concrete hardened with CO2?
|
| From what I've read this is a technique to lower the cost of
| concrete, so the added value would be capped at roughly whatever
| the price of concrete without CO2 is. There's also the possible
| substitute of CO2 derived from other sources with a lower
| recovery cost, such as sequestration at a plant as you mentioned.
| How much can be charged for captured CO2 and what's the market
| price?
|
| The big difference between plant sequestered CO2 seems to be the
| need to sweep up and store the CO2 which will be stored across
| the country. How will the infrastructure for offloading into the
| tank and delivering the captured CO2 work? How many tanks and how
| many trucks for moving the liquified CO2?
| HardEric wrote:
| the market for CO2 as a raw commodity is pretty large and
| growing significantly!
|
| I think your comment on the concrete capped price assumes that
| the price for producing CO2 does not increase. If current
| concrete produces CO2 (which it does produce a lot) and CO2
| gets taxed, it makes concrete that sequesters CO2 very
| financially viable even if it cost more than the current
| concrete market price. Plus I know I would pay more for
| concrete that sequesters CO2 so maybe that's another
| competitive advantage that allows it to cost slightly more.
|
| Plants are great and we love and support using our lands more
| effectively, but there is not enough land to store the CO2 that
| has been emitted over the last century from fossil fuels, and
| keep up with the increasing energy demand from population
| growth as well as developing nations. So plants cannot do this
| on their own.
|
| There is such a large market for CO2 (and its growing!) that we
| can find users of the CO2 very near our storage tanks. For
| example one pilot program we are planning right now has a CO2
| concrete producer only 6 miles away! Of course our CO2 hauling
| trucks will have our device and we will get better and better
| at leveraging existing infrastructure (pipe lines and trains)
| to transport CO2 efficiently.
| clipradiowallet wrote:
| Do investment opportunities exist within Remora? If so, where
| could I learn more about them?
| paulgross wrote:
| Thanks so much for the interest! Feel free to email us at
| hello@remoracarbon.com.
| angst_ridden wrote:
| Interesting. How does it interact with the standard DEF/SCR/DPF
| system, or does it replace it entirely?
| paulgross wrote:
| We add our device downstream of the DPF, so it's entirely
| complementary.
| angst_ridden wrote:
| Ah, I was hoping it would replace it, so the drivers don't
| have to stop and burn clean when they do too many short runs.
| pweezy wrote:
| This is really cool! Curious if you've heard of or been put in
| touch with Prometheus Fuels - another YC company that's working
| on synthetic gasoline/diesel production using direct air capture
| (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19842240). Seems like it
| could be a good combination - offload the stored CO2 from trucks
| at fuel stations, and put it into a fuel synthesizer that would
| likely work more efficiently with CO2, rather than raw air, as an
| input.
| HardEric wrote:
| Thanks for the suggestion, we agree a pretty cool partnership!
|
| Imagine one stop where you offload and refueling with synthetic
| fuel made from your previous exhaust. Pretty neat idea.
| edoceo wrote:
| How does keeping the weight on the vehicle affect is km/l ratio?
|
| Edit: full this device is only 6% of the max (80000lb) weight,
| maybe 15% weight on just the tractor.
| paulgross wrote:
| Exactly. We still need to do more dyno testing to get an exact
| figure, but we think the impact to fuel efficiency will be <
| 3%. We'll capture those extra carbon emissions, and we'll more
| than pay for the extra fuel cost by sharing the revenue from
| selling the carbon dioxide.
| SamBam wrote:
| > but we think the impact to fuel efficiency will be < 3%.
| We'll capture those extra carbon emissions,
|
| The more inefficient you make the trucks, the more carbon
| you'll capture!
| muthas wrote:
| After a recent discussion with our home heating oil provider,
| seeing this post got me thinking - could a similar system be
| applied to the exhaust of a household furnace that is burning No.
| 2 heating oil?
|
| A typical household in my part of the country runs around 1000
| gallons of oil per year (which I realize is less than 10% of a
| typical long-haul truck annual usage) but for larger sites like
| greenhouses/breweries/etc that have both heating and CO2 needs, I
| could see there being significant gains to having an on-site
| capture system.
|
| Even at the household side, it would be great to capture this
| tailpipe waste as a marketable resource... with the benefits of
| grid power and less concern over the size of
| storage/compression/regen equipment, I could imagine that the
| break-even point might be favorable.
| kleton wrote:
| Why would concrete producers buy carbon dioxide? It is a waste
| product of calcining limestone, no? Cement is not supposed to
| contain any carbonate at the end of the process.
| paulgross wrote:
| Companies like CarbonCure and Solidia are doing new work on
| technology that allows concrete producers to inject CO2 into
| concrete, which makes the concrete stronger. It's really
| exciting technology, and they've already got plants operating
| around the country.
| jenkstom wrote:
| I'm in the transportation industry and your use of "semi-truck"
| doesn't instill confidence.
| paulgross wrote:
| Good to know. We use the term "semi truck" because it's more
| widely used, and we figured that folks might not know the term
| class 8 truck!
| jimktrains2 wrote:
| This sounds pretty awesome! Best wishes!
|
| Any thoughts on using this on freight trains?
| HardEric wrote:
| For sure we want to capture CO2 from all the combustion engines
| in use, starting with the largest emitters puts trains and
| cargo ships next on the list.
|
| Lots of work to do to adapt our technology to those markets,
| but we love inventing new technologies!
|
| Thanks for sharing your thoughts
| Arubis wrote:
| This is such a minor thing compared to the actual tech you're
| building, for which you're rightly getting plenty of appreciation
| throughout this discussion.
|
| But:
|
| I _love_ that you're founding a company with a name that makes
| immediate sense and is clever! That's hard and it made me smile.
| paulgross wrote:
| Thanks so much! You might also enjoy that the legal name of our
| company is Echeneidae Inc. :)
| whalesalad wrote:
| Woah, based out of Detroit! Booya! I might need to come say hi
| and see what y'all are up to. I really dig this concept.
| paulgross wrote:
| We'd love to have you come by our shop any time - just shoot us
| an email at hello@remoracarbon.com!
| paulbaumgart wrote:
| This is great. I'm curious if this approach would work for
| residential fireplace chimneys, as well. Is that something you've
| explored?
| paulgross wrote:
| We haven't explored that, but carbon capture technology would
| work for residential chimneys. The challenge would be figuring
| out how to pick up the captured CO2 from so many different
| locations. One of the reason we're initially targeting trucks
| is that they drive on extremely concentrated freight corridors,
| so we'll mainly have to collect CO2 from truck stops along a
| set of key routes.
| paulbaumgart wrote:
| Makes sense, thanks! It would probably have to become part of
| the municipal garbage collection service.
| paulgross wrote:
| Totally. Definitely could be cool to explore down the line.
| ceedan wrote:
| Might be worth adapting this for restaurants with coal/gas
| fired ovens. They would more consistent producers of CO2 -
| not only during winter months. You could lease the capture
| devices to restaurants and take a larger portion of the co2
| revenue. The co2 capture might have marketing appeal to
| differentiate a restaurant from competitors, too.
|
| Maybe a chain like Blaze Pizza
| paulgross wrote:
| This is a great thought -- I have a similar response around
| the challenges with picking up the captured CO2 from such a
| decentralized network of capturing devices, but definitely
| something we'll explore down the line.
| MuffinFlavored wrote:
| > Adding our device to one truck is equivalent to planting 6,200
| trees.
|
| I'd love to hear about the stats + science that go into that
| claim expanded upon.
| burkaman wrote:
| Copying my comment from elsewhere in the thread:
|
| I think they're basing that calculation on this post
| (https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2015/03/17/power-one-tree-
| ve...), which points here
| (https://www.arborday.org/trees/treefacts/#climate), which
| links to the European Environmental Agency saying an average
| mature tree sequesters 22kg of carbon every year
| (https://www.eea.europa.eu/articles/forests-health-and-
| climat...).
|
| So, one tree is 22kg/year. So they're claiming their device
| will collect 6200*22=136,400kg of carbon per year from a truck.
| paulgross wrote:
| Exactly!
| rebuilder wrote:
| What's the percentage of CO2 captured, considering lifetime
| emissions from the whole process?
| paulgross wrote:
| Right now, we're probably at around 60-70% lifetime reduction
| (we're doing a comprehensive lifecycle analysis during our
| first pilots this summer). Over time, as the capture rate of
| our device approaches 100%, we think we can get close to 100%
| CO2 capture (since we'll be capturing the emissions from the
| truck and from transporting the CO2 to an end user, the main
| source of emissions). The only other source of emissions is the
| energy used by the pump at the offload station, and our early
| partners are powering that with renewable energy.
| tito wrote:
| Heya, nice to see this getting coverage.
|
| See you over on AirMiners, the place for 800+ entrepreneurs,
| engineers, and scientists mining carbon from the air :)
|
| http://airminers.org/
| paulgross wrote:
| Thanks Tito. We're big fans of AirMiners!
| LeonM wrote:
| What would the incentive be for the truck owner to install the
| device?
|
| How much weight will this add to the vehicle?
|
| How big is the device?
|
| How often does the truck driver have to 'empty' the device?
|
| How are you planning to set up a distribution network to get the
| captured carbon from the truck to the concrete producers?
|
| edit: typo
| paulgross wrote:
| We're starting with large companies that own their own fleets
| and have made aggressive climate commitments. We share the
| revenue from the carbon dioxide with them, so they have two
| incentives to install these devices: meet their climate
| commitments and generate a new stream of revenue from the CO2.
|
| The device currently weighs 3,200 pounds without carbon dioxide
| and 5,000 pounds loaded with carbon dioxide, and it'll get a
| lot lighter over time. We believe our device will qualify as
| "idle reduction technology" under federal law, and as "near-
| zero emission" under California law, meaning a truck with our
| device can weigh up to 80,550 pounds anywhere in the United
| States, and 82,000 pounds in California (above the usual 80,000
| lbs). So the hit to payload capacity will be less than the
| weight of the device.
|
| The device is 0.30 meters x 2.27 meters x 3.14 meters. It
| covers the back of a semi truck.
|
| The driver currently has to offload the CO2 every 600 miles,
| and we'll be significantly improving range over time.
|
| For our early partners, we'll install a CO2 tank at a
| distribution center or another facility of their choosing.
| We'll install our devices on trucks that do round trips to and
| from the facility so that they can offload the captured CO2 at
| the end of the day. Then, we'll transport the CO2 from the
| facility to a nearby concrete producer in a tanker truck
| (equipped with our device). As we grow, we will install CO2
| tanks at truck stops along our partners' highest-density
| routes. Our network will grow organically as we begin to work
| with more and more companies.
| danans wrote:
| > He saw first hand that these trucks have far less payload
| capacity and range, plus the batteries lose > 40% of their range
| in cold weather [2].
|
| Why not use a auxiliary battery heating system that uses some
| kind of fuel (i.e. biofuel) for this scenario? The amount of fuel
| needed to heat a battery to its optimal operating temperature
| during cold weather is probably orders of magnitude less than the
| amount of fuel needed to propel a truck, so the carbon emissions
| would be minimal. The same system could also be used for driver
| cabin heat.
| aryik wrote:
| I don't really have an interesting question for you, but I just
| want to say this is a fantastic idea and I wish you all the best!
| It is wonderful to see innovation like this in carbon
| sequestration.
| phtrivier wrote:
| Best luck to you.
| rkalla wrote:
| Unless you have local clients at every offload station, you find
| yourself in the position to burn more diesel to ship the liqufied
| carbon to consumers of it - is locking down routes/offload
| site/consumers all in the same 30 mile radiuses part of the
| rollout?
| paulgross wrote:
| Absolutely. One of our first pilot offloading stations is
| actually about 6 miles from a concrete producer. The other
| piece is that we'll add our technology to the tanker trucks
| that are transporting the CO2. It'll take us a few more years
| to get close to 100% capture, so between now and then, we won't
| be able to fully mitigate those extra emissions, which is why
| initially we're working with end users that are very close to
| our offload stations.
| core-questions wrote:
| Who consumes it, anyhow? What is it useful for? Can it simply
| be stored somewhere in mostly inert form? Can we pour it into a
| cave or a fracking hole or something and just let it be? Or
| does it turn back into a gas and escape?
| HardEric wrote:
| there are lots of uses for concentrated CO2. A few current
| uses include dry ice (shipping vaccines or other medical
| supplies), green houses, concrete, beverage carbonization,
| pumping it under ground into depleted oil wells for permanent
| storage, and refrigeration cycles.
|
| There are also a lot of technologies in progress to use CO2,
| such as turning it right back into synthetic fuels!
|
| The list goes on and seems to be growing by the day.
| [deleted]
| boringg wrote:
| This is an interesting idea - great to see people trying out new
| innovative ideas. I would have a couple questions: 1. How much
| energy is required to extract and regenerated the adsorbent? 2.
| How much energy to store CO2 and how much space on-site? (First
| two questions are trying to discern if it is truly a net negative
| product or if the remainder of the process diminish the carbon
| balance significantly) 3. How much are you anticipating selling
| CO2 and what is the level of purity (we use it for one of input
| gases at our company)? 4. What is the reload time for the trucks
| CO2 wise - and how much of an operational hurdle is the
| implementation/execution? Truck fleets are notorious for not
| wanting to change their systems, especially for new untested
| tech. (It is a thin margin business - risk tolerance is low) 5.
| Unfortunately you can't claim CO2 credits unless you sequester
| the CO2 - however selling to cement or other industrials you can
| lower their carbon abatement costs! Therefore for pricing you
| would price above typically CO2, but low enough that you are
| saving them abatement costs.
| paulgross wrote:
| 1. The regeneration process actually requires very little
| energy because we're able to use waste heat from the truck's
| exhaust to power the process.
|
| 2. The tank requires 8 ft x 8 ft (on a 16 ft x 16 ft pad). The
| pump and refrigeration unit are small and are mostly off, so
| they don't use a lot of energy. Our early partners are also
| powering them using renewable energy, to further help our
| lifecycle emissions reduction.
|
| 3. Our understanding is that the price of CO2 varies
| geographically, so it will depend on where in the country we're
| capturing CO2. We're still testing the exact purity of our CO2,
| but it's definitely > 95% and we believe we can get it to >
| 99%. What purity does your company use?
|
| 4. It only takes trucks a few minutes to offload the CO2. They
| don't have to unload or reload anything - they just have to
| attach a hose and the device pumps the CO2 into the offload
| tank. We want to make this as easy as possible for drivers. Our
| first partners are actually very large companies that own
| private fleets of semi trucks and have aggressive climate
| commitments, so they have a little bit more wiggle room to test
| new technology!
|
| 5. That's exactly our plan. In the short term, we'll be earning
| revenue by selling to the concrete producers or other
| industrials. In the medium term, we'll be mainly be earning
| revenue by permanently sequestering our CO2 deep underground.
|
| Let me know if I missed anything!
| nostromo wrote:
| This is super cool and I hope the founders are successful.
|
| > Adding our device to one truck is equivalent to planting 6,200
| trees. (remoracarbon.com)
|
| How is this physically possible? A mature tree might easily have
| 200kg of carbon stored in its wood. How can this tailpipe
| infrastructure store 1,240,000kg of carbon per tailpipe? At first
| glance it's an incredible claim, so a bit more explanation would
| be great.
| barbegal wrote:
| If a truck produces 1kg for every mile driven then 1.2 million
| miles would need to be driven over the truck's lifetime. It's a
| lot but certainly possible (some older trucks have driven over
| 5 million miles)
| burkaman wrote:
| I think they're basing that calculation on this post
| (https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2015/03/17/power-one-tree-
| ve...), which points here
| (https://www.arborday.org/trees/treefacts/#climate), which
| links to the European Environmental Agency saying an average
| mature tree sequesters 22kg of carbon every year
| (https://www.eea.europa.eu/articles/forests-health-and-
| climat...).
|
| So, one tree is 22kg/year. So they're claiming their device
| will collect 6200*22=136,400kg of carbon per year from a truck.
| paulgross wrote:
| This is exactly right. For an average semi truck (6 mpg,
| 100,000 miles/year), if we capture 80% of its carbon
| emissions, we'll be capturing ~ 135 metric tons of carbon
| dioxide per year, which is roughly the same as 6,200 trees *
| 22 kg/year.
| shafyy wrote:
| > Long term, if we pair our technology with biofuels, we can make
| a truck carbon negative.
|
| Carbon negative, you say? Easy solution to climate change then:
| Let's just put millions of your trucks on the roads and have them
| drive around all the time. /s
| thechao wrote:
| That's what carbon sequestration is? The proposed pipeline is:
| C02-in-the-air => biofuel crop => biofuel => carbon capture =>
| sequestration in concrete, etc.
|
| This is just a clever way to get _trucks_ and _farms_ to do the
| work with the infrastructure we have (mostly) in place, rather
| than a radical reimagining of our energy infrastructure.
|
| Not that I've seen proof this process would work, but I think
| that's the proposal.
| shafyy wrote:
| Biofuel is not a good source of energy. It uses a lot of
| land.
|
| It just doesn't make sense to emit all the CO2 to then
| recapture and sell it to someone. First, it's awefully
| inefficient, and second, do you think there's an infinite
| amount of demand for CO2 at a high enough price that it makes
| sense to jump through all these hoops?
|
| Unfortunately, the best solution for climate change is the
| least sexy, and therefore techies, VCs and the media don't
| jump on it. 1) Reduce emissions by "boring" things like solar
| power and less livestock agriculture, 2) increase the
| existing CO2 sinks that already exist in nature (forests and
| coastal areas).
| HardEric wrote:
| some great points! We agree why let the CO2 out into the
| atmosphere and then try to grab it, lets grab it right at
| the source.
|
| Biofuels like corn to ethanol might take too much land
| area, but the potential to get biofuels from algae or poop
| (yes poop is a great biofuel) require no additional land
| area and are very efficient. A biofuel research study at U
| of Michigan showed a biofuel process that produces -1 g/
| gallon burned GHG emission effect. We don't pretend to know
| exactly how to scale up biofuels but luckily there is a lot
| of research in progress on this!
|
| The other thing we could potentially do is convert the CO2
| directly back into a fuel, so the offload and fueling
| station is completely done at the same truck stop!
|
| Lastly we also agree that our technology does not allow
| society to exist exactly as it is now, we will always
| support reducing energy consumption where possible and
| better land use to let nature sink tons of CO2.
| shafyy wrote:
| Well, livestock agriculture is one of the biggest
| contributors to climate change, so taking their poop also
| doesn't make sense since we need to do away with
| livestock completely.
|
| Don't get me wrong, I think it's good that people are
| working on CO2 sequestration, but I just get triggered if
| I read something like "carbon negative trucks" which just
| is 101 greenwashing and gaslighting.
| paulgross wrote:
| Yes, that's exactly the proposal!
| paulgross wrote:
| We've definitely got a lot of work to do to prove that this
| solution can truly be carbon negative (we're actually
| partnering with the University of Michigan to test this over
| the next couple months), but many scientists agree that
| "bioenergy with carbon capture and sequestration" is one of the
| most promising forms of carbon removal. With biofuels, we could
| remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere for an order of
| magnitude less than direct air capture.
| [deleted]
| SamBam wrote:
| I mean, if it actually works, it would be turning plants into
| concrete, locking up their carbon. That would indeed be carbon
| negative. Probably a very inefficient way of doing so, if your
| only goal was turning plants into stored carbon, but if you're
| also getting zero-carbon shipping then it sounds pretty good.
| Ellipsis753 wrote:
| Growing plants/trees and then storing them underground _is_
| carbon negative.
| core-questions wrote:
| Nah, some asshole will come by in a million years or so and
| frack them to get fuel again ;)
| woranl wrote:
| Refining biofuel or renewable fuel involves GHG emissions.
| HardEric wrote:
| very true, but that's what a life cycle analysis is used for.
| Take all the emissions from manufacturing, use, and end of
| life. For this reason there are no zero emissions
| technologies (solar panels, electric car, cloth bags, even
| human waste produces significant GHG emissions).
|
| We will support independent sustainability research on our
| solution's life cycle analysis to verify if we can be carbon
| negative, and if not what changes can we make to get there.
| andi999 wrote:
| How big is the storage tank, in terms of volume? To me the one in
| the video looks too small. I would expect that co2 needs more
| space than the fuel (since oxygen is added). So a truck needs
| roughly 100 gallons of fuel for the distance you claim. I would
| be actually surprised if you can fit the co2 from that into a 400
| gallon container (but chemistry is not my strong suit). Any
| comments?
|
| Edit: I looked up some numbers. 1 gallon produces 9kg of co2, so
| 80% capture is around 7kg. Co2 has a density of 2g/l at 1 bar
| (0C). So at modest 200bar you have 0,4kg, so 1 gallon needs
| 7/0,4=17,5 litre, so 100 gallon 1750 litre=460gallons, and of
| course a 200 bar compressor.
|
| Does that sound right to you?
| paulgross wrote:
| The tank in the video is just a component of the device
| overall. The device is 2 cubic meters total, including the
| storage tank. We'll be storing 600 miles worth of CO2 at a
| time, or roughly 1800 pounds of CO2.
| HardEric wrote:
| You are onto something! The video is a proof of concept, so it
| has the components and performs the adsorption and such but
| could not capture or store enough for a 600 mi drive cycle.
|
| We are compressing the CO2 significantly, and currently working
| with tank manufactures to find the right balance between
| pressure, volume, and weight of the tank (goal is to store
| ~1800 lb of CO2).
|
| If you want to do math like this for a living we are hiring! :)
| didip wrote:
| How do people use the CO2 captured?
|
| Are there economical opportunities from the captured CO2?
| alexobenauer wrote:
| From the page:
|
| > We sell the carbon dioxide to concrete producers and other
| end users, and we split that revenue with our customers.
| masta wrote:
| One of the biggest end-user of CO2 is the fossil fuel
| industry, blowing CO2 into well to extract more fossil fuel
| .... Will OP make sure their product is not used to extract
| more fossil fuels?
| paulgross wrote:
| Yes absolutely. We're not going to use our CO2 to extract
| more fossil fuels - we're only going to work with end users
| (like concrete producers) that permanently sequester it.
| paulgross wrote:
| CO2 is used in concrete, greenhouses, refrigeration, dry ice,
| chemicals, fertilizer, carbonating sodas, etc. - there's
| actually 230 million tons of demand for CO2 every year! So
| plenty of opportunities for us to sell the CO2 we're capturing.
| tlb wrote:
| Neat! It's interesting how starting with small-scale applications
| can work better than the theoretically more-efficient stationary
| applications, because you can iterate and mass-produce.
|
| How much of a problem are things in the exhaust like sulfur and
| particulates? Do they end up poisoning or clogging the adsorber
| after some time, or does regeneration burn them off? Could you
| remove some of the particulates from the exhaust to save our
| lungs too?
| paulgross wrote:
| Our adsorbent actually captures the CO, NOx, and SOx in vehicle
| exhaust, so we'll be taking those out of the air in addition to
| CO2! Any particulate matter that makes it through the diesel
| particulate filter will cake onto our adsorbent, which we
| believe actually makes it more effective, so we'll be taking
| that out of circulation as well.
| snow_mac wrote:
| Are you accepting small time investors? I'm very interested in
| putting $10,000 towards this
| paulgross wrote:
| Thanks so much! Want to shoot me an email at
| hello@remoracarbon.com?
| boringg wrote:
| "He saw first hand that these trucks have far less payload
| capacity and range, plus the batteries lose > 40% of their range
| in cold weather [2]."
|
| I think you are referring to only electrical trucks; Hydrogen
| still carries on load and doesn't have the same operational cold
| weather challenges.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| The challenges in of hydrogen make it less practical than
| batteries. Storage at 10,000psi, incredible upper and lower
| explosive limits, hydrogen embrittlement etc.
|
| Have you ever met a truck mechanic who didn't perpetually smell
| of diesel? Do you want them working with explosive gasses
| instead?
| boringg wrote:
| Gas is as combustive as hydrogen - so not sure what you are
| referring to as a mechanic.
|
| Hydrogen leaks much faster and dissipates quickly into the
| atmosphere (unlike gas/diesel) defusing the risk of
| combustion (flip side is much harder to contain and systems
| need to be tighter). However if it gets caught under pressure
| it has a risk to it.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| Gasoline has an upper and lower explosive limit of 2% to
| 7%. What this means is by storing it in a moderately well
| sealed container it quickly becomes too rich to support
| combustion.
|
| Hydrogen is 4% to 75%. This means almost any concentration
| of hydrogen and oxygen is flammable.
| paulgross wrote:
| Exactly. The challenge with hydrogen that we've seen is that
| it's extremely flammable (even when mixed with a small amount
| of air) so it requires thousands of pounds of reinforcement to
| make it safe to carry on a truck, which dramatically cuts
| payload capacity. (Carbon dioxide, by contrast, is thankfully
| not at all flammable.) Then, of course, there are the
| challenges with producing carbon neutral green hydrogen, since
| currently 99% of the world's hydrogen is produced using natural
| gas or coal. Plus building out a hydrogen distribution and
| fueling infrastructure all over the world.
| boringg wrote:
| The challenge with Hydrogen is that it leaks quickly out of
| systems so they need to be very tight fitting. The combustion
| element isn't the huge challenge - in fact diesel and
| gasoline are more dangerous from an accident perspective if
| there is a tank leak because they remain on the scene setting
| up a flammability risk whereas hydrogen readily and
| incredibly quickly dissipates into the atmosphere.
|
| For hydrogen to work in the trucking space you work on end-
| to-end systems, therefore negating the need to change the
| entire infrastructure. You target 80% of the trucking
| industry and leave the last might to more carbon intensive
| mechanisms.
|
| I think the approach that best works for your company - and
| the one that I natively believe in: We need all of these
| technologies to change the future narrative and not fall into
| a situation where the new technologies are competing against
| each other.
|
| If you can remove the technology risk/operation risk and
| start deploying these systems quickly - you have a very
| promising opportunity ahead of you. Don't waste time trying
| to compete against EV or Hydrogen. All of the above is the
| approach.
| masta wrote:
| I'll be blunt. This sounds very fishy to me. Diesel creates about
| 2.6kg of CO2 per litre burned. So for a typical 500 litre tank of
| a Semi truck, you'll create 1.3tons of carbon. How exactly do you
| plan on storing that? How do you release it from its storage?
| When you store it under pressure, the release of the gas will
| create problems due to freezing. Not to mention the problems and
| energy requirements of pressurising 1t of carbon.
| [deleted]
| paulgross wrote:
| I appreciate the fish pun! This is why we're currently
| offloading the CO2 every 600 miles. Luckily, offloading only
| takes a couple mins, and drivers are legally mandated to stop
| every 8 hours (< 600 miles of driving), so they can just
| offload while they stop, or at the end of the day. 600 miles
| worth of driving creates about 1,800 lbs of CO2, which is very
| doable to store onboard a truck.
|
| To offload, the driver attaches a hose, which connects to an
| offloading tank, and the CO2 is pumped from the tank inside our
| device to the much larger offloading tank. We liquefy the CO2
| as it comes off the truck for storage in the tank. Luckily, the
| pump doesn't use much energy, and our early partners are using
| renewable energy to power the pump! We plan to continue using
| mc32 wrote:
| Is this likely to go on container ships and help them become
| more eco friendly?
| HardEric wrote:
| potentially yes that could be a market we expand to. We
| want to capture all the engine exhaust CO2 we can! So maybe
| trains as well.
|
| There are different exhaust compositions for the engines on
| these different vehicles, in part because they use slightly
| different fuels. So there will be some research and work to
| do before jumping into the next market, but we love
| developing technology that has never existed before, we are
| so excited!!
| faitswulff wrote:
| Does the weight of the CO2 negatively impact the fuel
| efficiency of the truck in any appreciable way?
| paulgross wrote:
| We think the impact to fuel efficiency will be < 3%, but
| we'll be doing more testing over the next couple months to
| get an exact figure. We'll capture those extra carbon
| emissions, and we'll more than pay for the extra fuel cost
| by sharing the revenue from selling the carbon dioxide.
| shrubble wrote:
| 18 wheelers get about 5 to 6 mpg, with a us gallon being 3.785
| liters (corrected) . Each mile thus is 0.63 or more liters of
| diesel.
|
| A truck can do at least 100k to 120k miles per year.
|
| So 63k to ~76k liters per year per truck. 63k * 2.6kg equals
| about 163.6 metric tons per year on the low end.
| edoceo wrote:
| It's 3.785 litres per US gallon.
| shrubble wrote:
| Corrected, thank you!
| edoceo wrote:
| Down thread it's explained that the device weighs 1000+ lbs
| more when full, after 600 miles.
|
| 600 miles isn't the full tank of combustion. Sound like driver
| is swapping tanks or something at one of their stops.
| yodelshady wrote:
| That makes for about 470 k per km captured, and they're not
| claiming 100% efficiency. So it passes that sniff test, at
| least. Weight is also plausible.
|
| Final q (other than cost): how much exhaust backpressure?
| paulgross wrote:
| This is a crucial question! To our surprise, our beta
| testing of our prototype has actually shown that this is
| creating < 0.5 psi back pressure on the engine (negligible)
| and we believe we can get it down to essentially 0 by the
| time we deliver our first units to customers this summer.
| [deleted]
| bjeds wrote:
| Are you saying 1 litre (about 0.71 kg) of fuel creates 2.6 kg
| of CO2? :-)
| sokoloff wrote:
| When you mix each 1 kg of fuel with around 3 kg of O2 during
| combustion, why do you think that outcome is impossible?
| olyjohn wrote:
| On the surface, it seems like you're only burning fuel in
| an engine. People forget, or may not even know that you're
| burning mostly air, and the fuel is there to help burn the
| air. I think this was a legit question to ask, as it's
| going to be a common misunderstanding for a lot of people.
| [deleted]
| thechao wrote:
| You're taking a bunch of `C` in the tank (AMU: 12) and 2x `O`
| out of the atmosphere (AMU: 16). This means the expected mass
| goes from 12 -> 44, or an increase of 3.6. My trusty
| calculator says that takes .71kg to 2.6kg.
|
| This is just approximate, since fuel has a bunch of H and S
| and other crap, so it's not 100% C. But, yes, these figures
| are in the right ballpark.
| bjeds wrote:
| You are correct of course. I was intending to make an
| alchemy joke about a particular phrasing of the parent
| poster (the part about creating 1 tons of "carbon"), but
| misread the entire message and commented on the wrong part.
| :-/
|
| Now the jokes' on me.
| masta wrote:
| Ah, my bad, yes obviously it creates ~1ton of CO2, not
| Carbon. :)
| oppositelock wrote:
| It certainly does. The O2 comes from the air and is heavier
| than carbon. The carbon comes from the fuel, which is its
| main content by weight.
|
| 1 kg of carbon from fuel + 1.75 kg of O2 from aith = 2.75 kg
| of CO2.
| SI_Rob wrote:
| I think some of the replies are missing your little
| s/carbon/CO2 sleight of hand there :)
| [deleted]
| deegles wrote:
| Did you decide to pursue carbon capture first and then start the
| company? I'm wondering if/how on-vehicle carbon capture is more
| energy efficient than e.g. using free air carbon capture to
| manufacture fuel? Though I suppose they could be combined.
|
| https://newatlas.com/direct-air-carbon-capture-cost-effectiv...
| paulgross wrote:
| The atmosphere is only 0.04% CO2, whereas vehicle exhaust is
| about 13% CO2, so it's much easier (and less energy-intensive)
| to capture CO2 from a tailpipe. We definitely want to partner
| with folks working to turn CO2 into fuel -- we'd love to turn
| our CO2 into fuel at truck stops so we can put it right back
| into the trucks.
| WarBrd wrote:
| Foretry is probably the best way of capturing carbon straight
| out of the air.
| Gracana wrote:
| Do drivers need a hazardous materials endorsement to drive a
| truck with your equipment attached?
| HardEric wrote:
| they do not. At least so far we have not had a regulatory
| hurdle that requires hazmat. Mostly because the CO2 is not
| flammable nor toxic (unless in a confined space, but hard to
| imagine a semi truck being in a confined space while our device
| is storing CO2).
| virtualdom wrote:
| > plus the batteries lose > 40% of their range in cold weather
| [2]
|
| The link you cited does not mention cold weather range loss for
| batteries. Can you provide a source for this claim?
| paulgross wrote:
| Oops, citations [1] and [2] got mixed up. This is the correct
| link:
| https://apnews.com/article/04029bd1e0a94cd59ff9540a398c12d1
| simonebrunozzi wrote:
| Why semi-trucks, and not boats? A single, large boat pollutes way
| more than hundreds of trucks.
| notahacker wrote:
| I can imagine scaling the tech up to deal with large ships is a
| lot more challenging.
|
| But I'm posting this from a small boat with a pretty standard
| diesel engine also used in agricultural and plant vehicles, and
| something like that would fit in my engine bay...
| paulgross wrote:
| We wanted to start by building a low-cost, modular device
| that we can retrofit onto existing semi trucks, since that's
| much easier than retrofitting onto a cargo ship or other
| boat. But we definitely hope to expand to mining haul trucks,
| locomotives, cargo ships and other bigger forms of long-haul
| transport down the line!
| wiz21c wrote:
| In your test you say captures "at least 80% of its carbon
| emission"; in the video it is "70 to 80% in ideal conditions"...
|
| So, in the end, how much is captured on average ?
|
| And once it is captured, in which conditions does it stay
| captured ? for how long ?
| cdreynolds wrote:
| The timeline between the video and now shows the progress we
| have made on average capture rates. The text is correct for
| where we are now. And we only use permanent storage options for
| our captured CO2.
| SamBam wrote:
| What's the nation-wide demand for CO2 for concrete? Is it high
| enough that they can continue to be your CO2 consumer if you add
| this to, say, 10% of trucks?
| paulgross wrote:
| There are 230 million tons of demand for CO2 worldwide every
| year, and all the semi trucks in the US produce 340 million
| tons of CO2. Medium term, though, we're actually planning to
| start sequestering the CO2 deep underground in depleted oil
| wells in exchange for government tax credits, because we know
| the market for CO2 utilization is finite. Long term, we'd love
| to turn the CO2 back into synthetic fuel right at the truck
| stop where it's offloaded.
| [deleted]
| uranium wrote:
| I presume you're using a heat exchanger to cool the exhaust and
| heat the discharging pellets. How big a temperature differential
| are you getting from the exchanger? How much extra energy do you
| need to put in for cooling? At switchover, how do you cool the
| pellets that you've just finished heating? Is the heating-
| compression cycle a lot faster than the collection cycle?
|
| Given the overhead and hassle of putting small units on a huge
| number of trucks, how does this compare to just putting a small
| number of larger units on power plants or furnaces?
|
| --How important is the CO2 concentration in the exhaust? Is this
| something that could be done just from atmospheric CO2, not on a
| concentrated source?--[Edit: Already addressed below.]
| HardEric wrote:
| this is a very detailed and thoughtful question!
|
| We have 2 or more chambers, we are balancing the number of
| chambers so that a chamber is always adsorbing while the other
| one (or 2) is transitioning temperature or holding a hot cycle
| to regenerate.
|
| We adsorb at ambient temperature so cooling the previously
| heated device is not too much energy, mostly just a fan, but
| there is some available cool refrigerant from our
| dehumidifier/heat pump cycle that removes moisture from the
| exhaust to help quickly drop the chamber temperature.
|
| We can use the exhaust waste heat to start heating the bed that
| is going into the hot regen cycle, then we use the waste heat
| from our exhaust dehumidifier to get the bed the rest of the
| way to the target hot cycle temperature.
|
| Its hard to explain in text, but you can see that we get to use
| the hot and cold cycles from the refrigerant cycle to do work
| for us simultaneously and take advantage of the heat in the
| exhaust itself!
| uranium wrote:
| Thanks, that's quite clear.
|
| What about the tradeoff vs. large stationary units on power
| plants? I know other folks are working on that as well; would
| love to know about how the economics work out vs. truck-sized
| units.
| paulgross wrote:
| The great thing about truck-sized units is that they can be
| modular, so we can easily mass produce them. The challenge
| with stationary units for power plants is that each one has
| to be custom-designed from the ground up. Plus, you have to
| put in tons of capital up front for a power plant, whereas
| our units are very cheap to make. That's why we think
| mobile carbon capture is the more scalable approach.
| rietta wrote:
| I associate Remora with the long running brand of made in USA
| sticky handgun holsters. Is there not a trademark conflict to use
| someone else's name? https://remoraholsterstore.com/
| spoonjim wrote:
| Trademarks are for a specific business. This isn't remotely
| related.
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