Beyond Oil and Gas The Methanol Economy书籍.pdf

Essays Alternative Energy Sources Beyond Oil and Gas: The Methanol Economy** George A. Olah* Keywords: environmental chemistry · hydrocarbons · hydrogen · methanol Oil and natural gas together with coal, purposes began slowly and became significant, but will not fundamentally the main fossil fuels, not only remain our more widespread in the 16th and 17th change the long-range outlook. major energy sources but they are also centuries mainly in England as a re- Besides petroleum oil and natural the feedstocks for a great variety of placement for wood, which was becom- gas (and also coal), we have additional manmade materials and products that ing scarcer. Coal became dominant in sources of “heavy” hydrocarbons, such range from gasoline and diesel oil to the 18th century with the invention of as heavy-oil deposits in Venezuela, oil varied petrochemical and chemical the steam engine and the industrial shales in various geological formations products, including synthetic materials, revolution, which was also fueled by including the US Rocky Mountains, and plastics, and pharmaceuticals. What na- coal, that followed. In the 19th and 20th vast tar sand deposits in the Canadian ture gave us as a gift, formed over the centuries, coal continued to satisfy the province Alberta. The relatively stable course of eons, is being used up rather ever-increasing energy demand of man- hydrates of methane, as found under the rapidly. Fossil fuels continue to be kind, and today it is used primarily for Siberia