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32 FEBRUARY 2016 FUEL OIL NEWS | www.fueloilnews.com BIO: Shane Sweet is an energy and manage- ment consultant with clients in the heating oil, propane and motor fuel sectors, a partner with the firm of Lake Rudd & Company. Sweet is the executive director and techni- cal director for the New York Propane Gas Association. He served the industry as president and CEO of the New England Fuel Institute from 2007 to 2011, and as executive vice president/director and lobbyist for the Vermont Fuel Dealers Association from 1993 to 2007. CONTACT: Sweet lives in Shaftsbury, Vt., and may be reached at shanem- sweet@gmail.com or 802-558-6101 cell/text. Suggestions by readers for future column con- tent, as well as general comments are welcome. http://www.linke- din.com/pub/ shane-sweet/7/a52/701 Shane Sweet OPERATIONAL INSIGHT C arbon" is a word we hear plenty. Back in the day when I first got into the industry, carbon dioxide as a contributing factor to climate change was a topic reserved for the scientific community. In fact, the term global warming was not even used until the mid 1970s, or so I've read. At the time, street-level discussion of carbon was limited to debate over which oil burner created the most of it (read: soot); or whether the quality of a competitor's diesel was inversely proportional to the amount of black smoke from a diesel engine. The EPA says carbon dioxide is the primary greenhouse gas emitted through human activities and in 2013, accounted for about 82% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions from human activities. Although fuel combustion by-products generally list carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, sulfur diox- ide, nitrogen oxides, lead and particulate matter, carbon gets painted as the bad boy, (depending upon where it is, of course). If carbon is bad, then in practical terms, car- bon is near or at the top of the list of problems energy folks have to contend with today. From a legislative, regulatory or political perspective, it's rare nowadays to hear the words 'fuel' or 'energy' without 'carbon' in the same breath. For power generation folks, carbon is a problem. Electricity in the United States for homes, business, and industry represents the largest single source of CO 2 emissions; accounting for about 37% of total U.S. CO 2 emissions, and 31% of total U.S. green- house gas emissions in 2013. For those fueling the transportation sector, carbon is a problem too. Transportation use of gasoline and diesel equates to the second largest source of U.S. CO 2 emissions, weighing in at about 31% of total U.S. CO 2 emissions and 26% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2013. For those in the business of fueling industrial processes, emission of CO 2 via fossil fuel combus- tion is, again, a problem. Fossil fuel combustion from various industrial processes accounted for about 15% of total U.S. CO 2 emissions and 12% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2013. With all this carbon floating around, so called carbon capture and storage (a.k.a "CCS") is con- sidered a plausible way to dramatically reduce carbon emissions in an affordable way. Given that you cannot store what you cannot capture, let's stick to capture for now. Capture means carbon (dioxide) is removed, or separated from, the entire power, heat or industrial process equation. Note that capture of carbon via CO 2 is considered a much easier and practical method for getting your hands on carbon. Three solutions can capture 90% of carbon dioxide emis- sions at commercial scale: Pre-combustion: "Pre" capture entails coal or gas pre-treated and converted into a mix of hydro- gen and carbon dioxide. "Oxy-fuel" combustion: "Oxy" systems burn coal or gas in oxygen instead of air. The result is a more concentrated carbon dioxide providing for easier separation. So called post-combustion capture: "Post" cap- tures CO 2 from the exhaust by absorbing it in a solvent and the absorbed carbon dioxide is then removed from the solvent. So, the good news is that the technology exists for capture; the bad news is that there were but a dozen commercial-scale CCS projects in operation as of a couple years ago, and that was worldwide. All we need now is an end-user level carbon capture device. This magic "black box" will be: Scrubbing CO 2 from combustion gases any- time fuel is being burned Integrated with a user-exchangeable carbon (dioxide) storage canister Small; perhaps no more than a cubic foot in volume Inexpensive, reliable and easily installed Run on line voltage or not, the latter runs on low voltage electricity produced by the engine or heating appliance. Great for areas where no power is available If we had a device that allowed us to simply, efficiently and inexpensively scrub carbon from the emissions of our furnaces, boilers, water heaters, we'd be the darling of the enviros, right? Maybe not. l F O N End-User Carbon Capture "