Floating factories of artificial leaves could make green fuel for jets and ships
Cambridge University scientists develop a device to ‘defossilise’ the economy using sunlight, water and carbon dioxide
The Cambridge project is based on a floating artificial leaf which has been developed at the university and which can turn sunlight, water and carbon dioxide into synthetic fuel. The group believe these thin, flexible devices could one day be exploited on a industrial scale.
I have no idea if this project is doomed from the start or the greatest thing since cheese and tomato on toast. Yet the word 'could' occurs six times in a comparatively short piece.
It could work or it could be a complete flop. As media folk know well, the word 'could' allows them to take advantage of a wide range of possibilities. Flop is my guess.
2 comments:
I see a possible resurgence of industrial activity in Britain's uplands of granite and millstone grit. You make 'em in Derbyshire and Yorkshire, float 'em downstream, and we lowlanders will harvest all the lovely electricity when they reach us. Great shoals of the stuff, like polythene duckweed.
Sam - as they describe these things as being protected by "micrometre-thin, water-repellent layers", I wonder if the word "plastic" is being avoided. If so, you may have to recycle them by transporting them back up north in electric trucks powered by the electricity you just harvested.
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