IMPROVING CATALYSTS FOR FUEL SYNTHESIS

WHOEVER SAID, “It’s difficult to make predictions, especially about the future,” probably wasn’t referring to Fischer-Tropsch (FT) chemistry. But the adage is apt just the same. The economics of commercializing FT synthesis—a catalytic carbon-carbon coupling process for making synthetic fuels and valuable chemicals—are driven in large part by the projected price of crude oil, “which is incredibly difficult to predict,” Burtron H. Davis says. Davis, who is associate director of the Center for Applied Energy Research at the University of Kentucky, Lexington, says if the price of crude oil remains near today’s record-high levels, then companies would have strong economic incentive to build new costly FT plants. For now, however, only a small number of companies are investing in the new plants. One of them, Sasol, in a joint venture with Qatar Petroleum, is now completing the start-up phase of its recently constructed facility in the Persian Gulf state of Qatar. As plant operators ...