- [Fernando] With the materials
I have worked in my lab,
they're called metal organic frameworks.
And they are kind of like
honeycombs, in which the holes
of the honeycomb are very very very small.
The size of molecules.
So this is a 3-D printed
model of one of those MOFs.
As you can see here, the way
the molecules are arranged
are in such a way that they leave
a little empty space in between.
In that empty space, we
can use it to store gasses,
or to do chemical reactions inside.
In this case we're using
it to carbon dioxide
to the fuse inside, and
use sunlight to promote
the reduction of the carbon dioxide.
So the light will strike the material.
The carbon dioxide is
inside, and that energy
that was captured by the
material from the sunlight
will be transferred to the CO2
to produce formate in any volume.
So, it's like photosynthesis,
in which plant pick up sunlight
and carbon dioxide and
turn it into a sugar.
So in this case, instead
of having a plant,
we have materials like this
that capture the sunlight
and turn the carbon dioxide
into something similar to sugar.
Particular metal-organic
framework, or MOFs,
is made out of titanium
in an organic compound
that captures a specific
wavelength of light,
in this case blue light.
So when this MOF captures the blue light,
and the carbon dioxide is stored inside,
the blue light will add
the energy necessary
to reduce the carbon dioxide
from carbon dioxide to formate.
This can be utilized, for
example, in a power plant.
So a power plant produces
a lot of carbon dioxide
because it's burning coal. And
when it's burning this coal,
one of the processes
that the power plant does
is called "scrubbing"
of the carbon dioxide.
So they separate it from
everything that's being burned.
A material like this, once
carbon dioxide has been scrubbed,
can be fed back into
one of these materials,
shine light directly from the sun,
and add the energy necessary
to produce more fuel.
That carbon dioxide can
be turned into a fuel,
and that fuel can be fed up
again into the power plant.
So then you can recycle
your own carbon dioxide
in your power plant,
and that helps to reduce
the emissions to obtain energy,
and to help fight global warming.
