Purpose: For thisw2wderrfreeee project, we were tasked with finding a problem that the world was currently facing and develop a biotech solution to the problem.
Problem: Vehicular Pollution Petrol is used to power millions of cars throughout the world each year, with 25% of cars causing 90% percent all air pollution. We rely so much on this fuel but it will not last forever. Estimates point to only 50 years before we have depleted the world's oil supply. Ideally, we would replace current cars with better options but since people don’t have the money to all get brand new cars, there has to be a stepping stone towards a clean and sustainable future. Bio-fuel is the perfect solution. Bio-fuel is any fuel made from recently alive living organism. These fuels can work in current cars, are renewable, and produce less greenhouse gasses, mainly through the increased absorption of pollution from crops used to make these fuels. Some estimates say they reduce greenhouse gasses by fifty percent. These crops can be grown locally, supporting local economies and reducing conflict and reliance on foreign countries. The main problems with current bio-fuels are that they produce less energy than petrol. Studies show varied results, some saying that bio-fuel is the most efficient source of energy currently on the market while others say that petrol produces twice as much energy. This is mainly due to the increased energy cost involved in maintaining the crops ex. Tractors and other farm equipment, equipment to process the crop and trucks to transport the crop. Also, currently, we must have crops that are made specifically for bio-fuel but hopefully, we can find a way to make cellulose into ethanol, meaning that you could use existing plant waste like corn stalks which is currently not being used for anything.
How could we realistically try the plan on a small scale in the lab.
There are four major air pollutants that come from cars- carbon monoxide due to fuel not burning completely, hydrocarbons being released from the exhaust pipe, nitrogen oxide due to fuel burning and lastly, particular matter which is small particles of harmful foreign substances that are released into the air.
Previous attempted solutions The use of oil products release more pollution than nature can handle. This increases risk of developing cancer and lung diseases. Electric cars have a smaller environmental impact than conventional cars. These cars get their power from batteries installed inside the car. The batteries can be charged using traditional wall outlets which are powered by sustainable energy sources such as nuclear fission. Electric cars do not emit toxic gases or smoke into the environment.
Solar panels are a type of panel designed to absorb the sun’s rays and convert it into usable energy- usually used for generating electricity or for heating and cooling systems. But even though solar panels are great for a natural energy source, they come with many limitations. The three largest and most common issues are inability to generate power at night or when the sun levels are low, inability to increase power production to meet demand, and lastly solar panels tend to be very expensive to buy and install.
Current limitations Electric car batteries are difficult to dispose of and require mining to make. These batteries also do not last forever and the cost to replace them is very high. These cars are only as good as the energy produced by their country. In countries like the us that power homes through a variety of renewable, clean energy, these cars are better for the environment but in countries like india, that rely on unclean sources such as coal, these cars can actually be worse for the environment.
Solar panels are very expensive to install. The cost to cover an entire home usually costs tens of thousands of dollars. Also, it may take up to 10 years to 15 years before you can break even Not all types of houses are suitable for solar panels. Houses that are covered with trees and landscapes and surrounded by tall building are not the best fit.
Our Plan: Our solution is to find a way to use cellulose in biofuel. This would mean all the current benefits of biofuel with less overall crops. Instead of planting crops specifically for biofuel, current crops like corn could be used. The stalks, husks and other seemingly useless waste would be harvested and converted to biofuel. This process would be made commercially viable by increasing production speed and volume. This would allow for cheaper and more biofuel. We are going to use enzymes to break down the ethanol and turn it into biofuel. These enzymes turn the cellulose into sugars. Then, conventional fermentation can be used to turn the sugars into ethanol. This type of biofuel is estimated produce 74% less greenhouse gases than current ethanol. Compared to 100% petrol, current ethanol blends which only reduces greenhouse gasses by about 4%!
Cellulose is a biological compound with the chemical formula (C6H10O5)n meaning a combination of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. Depending on the plant, cellulose can make up a huge majority of the plant; 33% of all plants, 50% of wood and 90% of cotton. Cellulose is very rigid, making it a perfect material for plant structure but most animals, including humans, don’t have any naturally occurring enzymes to digest it so, when eaten, it just acts as fiber. Most of the plant that we don’t eat, such as on corn the stalk, leaves, husk, tassel, and roots, is primarily cellulose and goes unused. By using this part of the plant, we can create more fuel with the same plant, not waste extra space and resources for new, biofuel specific crops, save money, and save energy required to tend crops.
The type of biofuel we are trying to create is called ethanol. This is already a very common additive in petrol; many brands of petrol contain around 10% ethanol. The chemical formula for ethanol is C2H5OH1. When combusted, the reaction produces the products CO2 and H2O, more commonly known as carbon dioxide water. These compounds are used by plant to grow and create more food; plants need water and suck in CO2 expelling O2. The specific part of ethanol that makes it so combustible is the hydrocarbons.
How an Internal Combustion Engine Works: The process starts with a small amount of petrol is injected into a small area and mixed with lots of oxygen. This mixture is electrically ignited using what is known as a spark plug. This causes the liquid to turn into a gas rapidly expanding around 500x of the volume of the liquid. This pushes down a piston completely vertically, which is connected to the crankshaft by a rod. This crankshaft is essentially what moves and powers the car. The carefully timed cycle goes like this. The piston moves down to accommodate oxygen and petrol. Then, it moves up to compress the mixture. When this piston is fully raised, the spark plug ignites it and forces it down. This vertical force is then translated into a circular force.
Why Ethanol Cannot be used in high concentrations in current cars:
Ethanol can theoretically work in all cars in concentrations of about 85% but opens up a huge area for problems. Ethanol can easily retain moisture from the atmosphere and from rain. This water mixes with the fuel and when the water concentration gets high enough, it will come out of suspension in the fuel and turn the fuel into a globby mess. The fuel can also corrode engine parts.
Testing Process (Efficacy tests)
Topic: Making Biofuel Objective: test same cure with different fuels to find which one is more efficient
Materials- gasoline, biofuel, 3 cars Other needed materials- timer, 3 drivers, a street
Independent variable- what were putting in the cars Dependent variable- driving distance on nuetral, driving speed, car model
Procedure Fill up car with desired fuel (1 gallon) Drive until you can’t anymore while making observations Record observations and statistical evidence Repeat steps 1-4 for all cars Compare and contrast data
Data collection and recording- Recording mileage achieved & wear and tear on engine to determine which one is more efficient
Topic: Burn Test
Independent variable- amount of car fuels Dependent variable- the temperature and time at which the fuel burns Controlled variable- same amount of fuel burned each test. Burned inside all with same conditions.
Procedure: Fill metal dish with 4 oz of fuel Make sure thermal camera is recording Burn fuel Record and observe observations Repeat with other fuels
This data will show us how flammable and at what heat it burns. With this data we could analyse which is the best for a car to run off of and share the evidence with other scientists.
Topic: Finding the best plant for ethanol.
Materials to be tested: Corn Grass Potato Wood
Other materials tested: Distillation Apparatus Acid Hot Plate Beakers H2O
Independent Variable Plant matter
Dependent Variable Energy produced per liter.
Controlled Variables: Acid Type Fermentation Period Distillation Technique Room temperature Volume of reactants
Procedure: Soak plant matter in acid for a period of time Ferment product using water and enzymes Distil the product to isolate the ethanol Compare the amount of energy contained in each type of ethanol using car test
Results: This will allow us to create a variety of biofuels made of different plants. We then determine which plant is best for creating biofuel by seeing which fuel produces the most energy.
Next Steps: After the experiment is over, we will take the products of this experiments and test it in the car test. To summarize this test, we will put a specified volume of ethanol into a car and drive said car at a constant speed until the car completely stops and runs out of fuel. The fuel that takes the car the furthest is the superior fuel.
Reflection:
This project was both inspiring and disappointing. We were able to see some of the amazing solutions people have come up with to solve world problems. This was unfortunately outweighed by the general public opinion on major world problems such as global warming. There are many promising solutions but many people don't believe these issues will effect them. I was overall very proud of our solution and our depth of understanding of the issue but how we would accomplish our ideal solution seemed like an after thought. Basically, we determined that biofuel is a great alternative energy fuel since it works in current cars, is renewable and better for the environment. However, we saw there were many drawbacks to current biofuel solutions and we saw the current quest to make cellulose into biofuel could solve many of these problems. Unfortunately, we did not really have a good grasp on how our solution, using acid to turn cellulose into sugar that would be easily converted to ethanol.