A breakthrough in carbon capture and storage: turning CO2 into coal I ran across this innovative method of carbon dioxide sequestration, while looking up some information about fungi. It is a clever use of Gallium alloys that have melting points near room temperature, to serve as electrodes with doping of other catalytic ions (cerium etc) to reduce CO2, which is pretty hard to reduce. The product of the reduction is a carbonaceous solid, that had previously been a problem as it "coked" up previous electrodes. (Not that kind of COKED UP, you druggies) The advantage of the liquid metal electrodes is that the coke-like product falls off in sheets that are easy to capture.
The black carbonaceous material can be buried, but it sure looks similar to Bio-Char to me.
Does anyone know why this hasn't caught on as a carbon sequestration method, particularly since it produces a product that could be utilized in compost and soil improvements?
I have enjoyed playing with Woods metal, one of the low melting alloys, that was quite toxic from cadmium, unlike Gallium. We cast some spoons of it that melted when used to stir coffee
