Here's a scientific layman's interpretation of some very promising-sounding biotechnology: we can soon hook up biotech devices to power plants that will convert CO2 into liquid fuel that can be used in most gasoline blends.
Global climate change has prompted efforts to drastically reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas produced by burning fossil fuels.
In a new approach, researchers from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have genetically modified a cyanobacterium to consume carbon dioxide and produce the liquid fuel isobutanol, which holds great potential as a gasoline alternative. The reaction is powered directly by energy from sunlight, through photosynthesis.
http://www.rdmag.com/...
And to quote the team lead:
While other alternatives to gasoline include deriving biofuels from plants or from algae, both of these processes require several intermediate steps before refinement into usable fuels.
"This new approach avoids the need for biomass deconstruction, either in the case of cellulosic biomass or algal biomass, which is a major economic barrier for biofuel production," said team leader James C. Liao, Chancellor's Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at UCLA and associate director of the UCLA–Department of Energy Institute for Genomics and Proteomics. "Therefore, this is potentially much more efficient and less expensive than the current approach."
This sounds much more doable than CO2 sequestration and/or the big CO2 sucker things.
Or maybe all of the above.
Cheers to the scientists!
H/T Raw Story.