As Ozone alert days settle in on the DFW area once again…
Several years (decade?) ago I remember seeing a story about the possibility of reducing vehicle emissions by using a scrubber like system mounted or incorporated with the radiator.
The scientist investigating this felt we had done all we could at the exhaust end. He argued that it would be possible to make cars very low pollutors and, with improved technology, zero or even negative emission vehicles because they could clean more air as they drove then the amount of pollution released through their exhaust.
Hadn’t seen or heard anything about this since so I have to wonder if this theory was all it was cracked up to be.
Presuming that the nitrogen and sulphur compounds as well as ozone are the major pollutents we are fighting, what engineering hurdles would have to be overcome to produce a scrubber for a car? Is there a catalyst that would work? What type of net emissions reduction would we be looking at and would it be cost effective enough to incorporate in all vehicles?
Heeeeyyyyy… I remember hearing about that. Wasn’t Volvo doing something along those lines?
Like you, this is something “I heard somewhere” and I don’t remember hearing about it since.
A third to remember…but not where.
The idea was to lay a catalyst on the radiator, drawing in Nox
contaminated air and converting the Nox to nitrogen and oxygen.
Honda has claimed that the exhaust from it’s Insight alternate fuel car is cleaner than the air going into the engine on about 30 days a year in Los Angeles.
The miraculous claims that the media reported somehow have not survived practical studies of implementation, is what my friend from Chrysler tells me.
As long as they produce CO[sub]2[/sub] or the electricity they use is produced from processes that release CO[sub]2[/sub], they are always positive emission vehicles.
I remember seeing something about this. It’s only aimed at reducing ground-level ozone (smog). The concept was putting a catalyst on car radiators that would break down either nitrogen oxides (which react to form ozone) or ozone itself. The idea being that driving a car around brings the radiator into contact with a lot of air, which could then be cleaned.
It’s a well, I won’t say sound, but at least plausible idea – there’s no prior reason you couldn’t build a radiator like that. I have serious doubts about whether it would turn out to be worthwhile, though. Even if it turns out to achieve any real reductions, there’s cost, maintenance of the things, and the fact that the cars may not be driven around where you really need ozone reductions (there’s this thing called wind… that’s why Acadia park in Maine has poor air quality).
And Anthracite’s right, CO2 is still a pollant from most cars (unless they’re electric-and-recharged-by-wind-or-solar-or-hydro-generators).