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At 3:08, the animation shows water being reduced and CHCl₃ being oxidized by the water. However, one of the resources which was cited suggests that it is the not the case, and that it is the oxidant ("pure oxygen, air or other gaseous mixture but in an amount preferably equal to or greater than the stoichiometric amount required for full oxidation of the organic material.") dissolved in the supercritical water which reacts with the organic material. edit: patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/8a/22/78/01f602b289f928/US4338199.pdf
Just in case links are blocked At 3:08, the animation shows water being reduced and CHCl₃ being oxidized by the water. However, one of the resources which was cited suggests that it is the not the case, and that it is the oxidant: "pure oxygen, air or other gaseous mixture but in an amount preferably equal to or greater than the stoichiometric amount required for full oxidation of the organic material." dissolved in the supercritical water which reacts with the organic material.
Australian Brush-turkeys (Alectura lathami) build compost piles to incubate their eggs so that they won't have to sit on them, then add or subtract vegetation to control the temperature. Don’t want to hard-boil the kids!
A team in Reykjanes Iceland are piping water down a hole near lava to make super critical steam which comes up another pipe. The steam drives a turbine to make electricity. Drilling a single hole with concentric pipes would make a long Liebig condenser. Decending water and waste would be heated by rising water, CO2, H2 and salts. If you don't have lava the rock at the bottom of the hole could be heated with electricity when renewables over produce. The H2 can be used for ammonia, and the rest can be mineralised in basalt (see Carbfix also in Iceland).
I remember there being a planet that is close enough to it’s star that the heat, and pressure made it a ice planet that is extremely hot. Would that ice be a supercritical ice planet.
Not sure if that's a reference that's going over my head, but on the off chance its a serious question: If you look at the diagram around 1:50, there isn't really a supercritical solid state. If the water is solid that simply means the temperature isn't high enough to convert it to liquid at the given pressure (never mind hitting that supercritical point). It might be interesting to find a planet that's both hot enough and dense enough to have supercritical oceans though. Not sure how much we'd be able to learn about it from so far away but I'm sure we'd discover at least one or two fascinating things!
@@altrag gj 436b they also call it the planet of burning ice. The pressure force the water to form into ice, while it’s constantly being heated up by its star.
I've seen videos of deep sea vents where the water was coming out of the vent red hot. Although, I'm unsure how deep The deep-sea vent was, or the actual temperature since it was not disclosed in the videos. But, it was clearly glowing red which means it was very hot indeed. It actually looked like one of those flickering neon candles.
Although resolving the forever chemical problem would be wonderful, I feel like, based on past experience, storing pollutants underground may not be the best solution. "Let's just put this underground and deal with it later. I'm sure it will be fine."
I agree I grew up in Hobbs NM which is not too far from W.I.P.P waste isolation pilot plant where the US department of energy stores an ungodly amount of nuclear waste in an old salt mine which is honestly so very stupid😢
IMO in this case its a good idea. All the Carbon from the CO2 came out of the ground in the first place, as oil gas or coal. As the Method of storing CO2 underground binds it into rock (or in other words, its no longer there as a gas) they are more or less completly safe
@@drewgehringer7813 preferably not on this planet it's an unnatural amount of toxic material that lasts for millions of years if you ask me I think the world's better off without so many humans then we wouldn't need so much power to be generated to be honest. 🙂
Sub critical water at temperatures above 250 Celsius exhibits simular properties at much lower pressures. Hydrous pyrolysis, Wet Oxidation, & Thermal Depolymerazation are names used for these processes. The lower temperatures and pressures make them easier to implement but require reaction times between 15 to 30 minutes. This reaction has been used to break down everything ftom old tires and plastics to chemical waste. It is a sealed process to maintain required pressure.
Not really my place to promote but this is one of the coolest ideas I've come across as a young adult in the wastewater field. There is a company, 374 Water (scwo)-ticker- that is trying to take this to the real world. They are highly ambitious and I've actually seen one of their demo reactors here in Kokomo Indiana. They have a little way to go but given the right equipment and "fuels" these things could really take off. Pfas and other dissolved solids are a big deal and it's going to be extremely difficult to remove without some sort of process like this. These reactors can't handle normal "water" though, has to have a good source of fuel to keep it going. There is a lot to expand on this but it's here and it's real. Not perfect but very very cool 😎
@@massimookissed1023 Honestly, with the effects PFAS has on human health I would consider that a worthwhile effort. Now if we can also replace the materials that need PFAS we can once and for all remove it instead of everyone having to suffer for eternity.
What about the energy needed to make this work at all? Because we all know how much energy it takes to heat water up and then you have to build that much pressure on top of that for every volume of fluid you are going to do this too.
A similar process is used in (still) pilot plants where we half burn waste in order to produce biofuel. Once the process is started, it is just a matter to continuously provide more waste and a fraction of the biofuel is used to maintain the cycle. Yes, it still produces more CO2, but it is less problematic than the methane it would produce "naturally" in the dumps. But we can also make polymers and substrate for fungi growth, for building for example, sequestering the CO2 into infrastructure. Edit: we can burn almost anything in that process, too, much like in this video. Tires, pans, hospital waste, clothes, anything, really. Metals can be taken away during the final stages of the burn and recycle Cadmium (extremely toxic), platinum, gold and Rare Earth.
Thats incredibly cool. Discoveries like this are a godsend and the future and thank you to the scientists who work tirelessly to deliver them everyday.
Fire dissolving and fire removing There is fire at the bottom of the ocean Under the fire, carry the fire Remove the fire from the bottom of the ocean Fire dissolving and fire removing
Supercritical Water Oxidation also works on PFAS, and is also a good way to recycle interspecies waste when trading with aliens. Oh, and a good way to destroy evidence if you're smuggling contraband.
Wonderful for applications in space but this tech could be applied here on earth for a number of issues. Most of us will continue to live here for the decades foreseeable.
The reaction you describe sounds more like we'd be dissolving our waste, like with an acid, rather than burning it like with combustion, I'm assuming the word choice is due to the chemistry of the reaction?
Storing CO2 underground? Are we talking about Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)? Isn't that only considered somewhat viable for very large CO2 emitters, such as Oil and Gas companies? It would be very surprising if CCS was implemented for specific waste decomposition applications before there was enough abundance of resources to set up CCS affordably on small scales.
I'm guessing the "water toasters' and 'steam oven toasters' appearing on the market cook/brown using this, or related, process. Thanks for the explanation.
One thing I want to add is that the systems I've seen are intended for hydrogen production rather than specifically to treat the water. The oxygen is used in the pyrolysis (or is this one hydrolysis? I can't recall) and the outgoing products would be xO2 (CO2, SO2, etc) alongside non-oxidized H2 hydrogen pairs. Which we then use into fuel that can produce even more of that clear drinking water we were talking about. Alongside the thermally treated, chemically inert water that was processed up to supercritical pressure/temps as well, of course. ;)
Do you mean Steam Gasification? Pyrolysis is basically just a thermal decomposition process; it doesn't need oxygen to do that since it is an inert process.
@@s0ul216 No, they're processes that involve high temperature water but operate under different parameters to produce different results. I imagine it's mostly pressure and mechanical processes. Generate steam -> Steam blasts hydrocarbon source -> Steam causes thermal decomposition and gas shift reactions. Vs submerging the material in water and heating the whole thing up, then venting the hydrogen/CO2 that'd result. It's different in the way hat hydrolysis of carbon-based matter into hydrochar is different from steam gasification with different chemical results.
Don't some advanced power stations already use water that's heated to supercritical or near state. I know I read that some heat water under pressure to the point where it is indistinguishable from steam? Do they just reach the critical point approaching supercritical state or achieve it?
Supercritical substances in general are very useful. Geothermal utilities are looking into supercritical CO2 as a way to get more heat out of very deep geothermal wells. It’s way more efficient at transferring heat than liquid water and any noxious heavy metals that it comes in contact with will have a harder time finding their way into groundwater deposits.
Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. Without it all plant life dies. If being a greenhouse gas is what makes you call it a pollutant, then so is water vapor. Do you classify water as a pollutant also?
Undecided with Matt Ferrell covered a similar topic a year or two ago about how a European company is working with waste treatment facilities in Europe and the US to setup whats effectively a pressure cooker for sewage. Its supposed to have a similar effect as what is described here but they are able to control the resulting by-products based on the temp and time to make things like bio-coal and the ingredients to make other bio-fuels on top of breaking down those PFAS chemicals. It supposedly is supposed to replicate the process of how fossil fuels came to be made naturally only sped up to an absurd degree. It also limits the need for things like more complex filtration systems since all the organic material becomes more simple in the bio-fuel example or an outright filter itself in the bio-coal. You could literally turn waste treatment facilities into mini power plants with a steady "fuel supply" though not exact numbers were given to show whether it would be a power surplus or not.
Is it just a coincidence that difference between water's freezing point (0C) and absolute zero (-273C) and water's critical point (373C) and boiling point (100C) is 273 degrees? Or is there some physics behind it?
I hate these non-stick pans, because you're not meant to cook with metal with them. I always cook with metal, it's just how I like to cook. (Sorry hotel pans.) I don't use non-stick pans at home... what was wrong with stainless steal and cast iron? I think we'd all be better off without non-stick.
First off, I just got an ad for cremation services after the video.... Second off, I highly doubt that there is enough pfas chemicals out there to have to worry about their carbon footprint when breaking them down with supercritical water. Now with bulk waste like microplastics, we'll definitely need to figure something out for that particular footprint
nice,however,pumping co² underground is a big mistake,what if it comes to the surface over time (and even faster because of an earthquake) these amounts would be catastrofic if they were released simultaniously,what about something that also breaks the co² bonds into its inert components?
Can SciShow PLEASE do a video on CO2 recapture technology??? @donutmedia recently did a video about Porche’s synthetic hydrocarbon fuel (E-Fuel) using ocean water and aqueous CO2. I would LOVE a more researched and thoroughly explained video on this process and I think it could really help with educating the public about the climate crisis!
And then you will have contaminated plants producing contaminated food. And that *_is not_* a good thing to have in space. Now, what about using your brain once and a while?
Im wondering if this supper critical water could be used to produce graphene. if it coul dissolve graphite then we can dilute carbon solution down to atom status
An interesting topic. I didn't realize that water's critical point was that low. That would seem to indicate that modern power plants are operating in the super critical regime, which is pretty cool. Or hot, actually. As an aside, "One crisis after another"... That's life in a world with WAY too many people for ya...
I'm really curious, i know this question might be dumb but please if someone that is an expert on the field answer me ☺️ Why water don't ignite in high temperatures? I mean it has hydrogen and oxygen in it right?
Water is the product of burning hydrogen and oxygen! It's "already burnt". If you burn something containing carbon and hydrogen, which is most fuels, with oxygen gas, that creates carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O). If you burn pure hydrogen gas with oxygen and there's no carbon in the mix, you get only water.
Something I've been wondering my whole life-- where do the bubbles in boiling water come from? It's like air bubbles magically appear at the bottom of the pot. Are they from water being broken apart into oxygen and hydrogen? I suppose I could've just looked it up at some point.
The bottom of pot is much hotter so water at bottom is gets boiled first it is then converted into water vapor they rise up as they are hot and less dense, on reaching top they burst. It does not break in hydrogen or oxygen it is still water but in gaseous state.
what about Hydrothermal liquefaction or carbonization at lower temperatures? they seem much more promising on Earth because they require lower temperatures (less energy) and produce less CO2 and more useful byproducts like bio-derived crude oil and/or coal. The other big advantage of the lower temperature processes is that heavy metals mostly end up in the coal and nitrogen phosphorus and potassium for fertilizer all end up in the water where it can be easily concentrated into fertilizer when you purify the water.
They should put the co2 byproduct in barrels and put the barrels in a separate supercritical water factory where there’ll be a machine that disposes of the barrels in supercritical water and repeating the process of putting the co2 byproduct in barrels forever - I don’t know
So all we have to do to destroy the harmful things we voluntarily created is *checks notes* "use enough energy to raise water to 700 degrees F". We are so good at this
373 Centigrade is NOT "three times the temperature of root-pressure boiling water". You need to use the Kelvin scale, so 100C is 379K (if I remember correctly) and 373C is 652K, only approximately DOUBLE the temperature. Silly mistake, especially for a science channel.
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3:38 The (supercritical water) oxidation of ammonium can’t yield any carbon dioxide because it doesn’t contain any carbon. At most it’ll yield nitrogen oxides (NOx), air pollutants.
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Visit brilliant.org/scishow/ to get started learning STEM for free. The first 200 people will get 20% off their annual premium subscription and a 30-day free trial.
At 3:08, the animation shows water being reduced and CHCl₃ being oxidized by the water. However, one of the resources which was cited suggests that it is the not the case, and that it is the oxidant ("pure oxygen, air or
other gaseous mixture but in an amount preferably equal to or greater than the stoichiometric amount required for full oxidation of the organic material.") dissolved in the supercritical water which reacts with the organic material.
edit:
patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/8a/22/78/01f602b289f928/US4338199.pdf
Just in case links are blocked
At 3:08, the animation shows water being reduced and CHCl₃ being oxidized by the water. However, one of the resources which was cited suggests that it is the not the case, and that it is the oxidant: "pure oxygen, air or
other gaseous mixture but in an amount preferably equal to or greater than the stoichiometric amount required for full oxidation of the organic material." dissolved in the supercritical water which reacts with the organic material.
First we had electricity, which was a new type of fire. Now we have another type of fire, too!
Straw and hay is a fire hazard if it's too wet. The water allows bacteria to heat it up even to the point of burning.
Oh thats wild! I had no idea.
Damn, I thought they were dangerous when dry. This bacteria sound very cool, a rabbit hole for tomorrow night.
hay bales can also explode, thought that was cool until it started fires
Compost piles can burst into flames. that is why you are supposed to stir the pile occasionally.
Australian Brush-turkeys (Alectura lathami) build compost piles to incubate their eggs so that they won't have to sit on them, then add or subtract vegetation to control the temperature. Don’t want to hard-boil the kids!
A team in Reykjanes Iceland are piping water down a hole near lava to make super critical steam which comes up another pipe. The steam drives a turbine to make electricity.
Drilling a single hole with concentric pipes would make a long Liebig condenser. Decending water and waste would be heated by rising water, CO2, H2 and salts. If you don't have lava the rock at the bottom of the hole could be heated with electricity when renewables over produce. The H2 can be used for ammonia, and the rest can be mineralised in basalt (see Carbfix also in Iceland).
I remember there being a planet that is close enough to it’s star that the heat, and pressure made it a ice planet that is extremely hot. Would that ice be a supercritical ice planet.
Not sure if that's a reference that's going over my head, but on the off chance its a serious question: If you look at the diagram around 1:50, there isn't really a supercritical solid state. If the water is solid that simply means the temperature isn't high enough to convert it to liquid at the given pressure (never mind hitting that supercritical point).
It might be interesting to find a planet that's both hot enough and dense enough to have supercritical oceans though. Not sure how much we'd be able to learn about it from so far away but I'm sure we'd discover at least one or two fascinating things!
It's called superionic ice and doesn't have the same structure or properties as normal water ice (not formed from ice or under the same conditions).
@@altrag gj 436b they also call it the planet of burning ice. The pressure force the water to form into ice, while it’s constantly being heated up by its star.
@@Tzimisce thanks.
Aren't there like 17 different phases of water ice? The phase diagram for H2O is a lot more complicated than just what was shown in the video.
Fascinating info! Can't wait to hear more from my favorite science channels!
Question! Do underwater volcanic vents get there? Or does that heat/pressure/water not get there?
Oh second this for more attention to it
The pressure in the deepest trenches is over 1000 atmospheres and you only need 217.7. Min temp is 379 C and black smokers get to 400 C, so yeah.
@@filonin2 Yep, IIRC its noticeable in the geology afterwards
Love when the comments have the answers I seek
I've seen videos of deep sea vents where the water was coming out of the vent red hot. Although, I'm unsure how deep The deep-sea vent was, or the actual temperature since it was not disclosed in the videos. But, it was clearly glowing red which means it was very hot indeed. It actually looked like one of those flickering neon candles.
Although resolving the forever chemical problem would be wonderful, I feel like, based on past experience, storing pollutants underground may not be the best solution.
"Let's just put this underground and deal with it later. I'm sure it will be fine."
I agree I grew up in Hobbs NM which is not too far from W.I.P.P waste isolation pilot plant where the US department of energy stores an ungodly amount of nuclear waste in an old salt mine which is honestly so very stupid😢
IMO in this case its a good idea. All the Carbon from the CO2 came out of the ground in the first place, as oil gas or coal.
As the Method of storing CO2 underground binds it into rock (or in other words, its no longer there as a gas) they are more or less completly safe
@@daltonsoutherland8836 where else would you put it? a salt mine is geologically stable over millions of years and below the water table.
@@drewgehringer7813 preferably not on this planet it's an unnatural amount of toxic material that lasts for millions of years if you ask me I think the world's better off without so many humans then we wouldn't need so much power to be generated to be honest. 🙂
Can it... Hum.. dissolve a body? Asking for a friend
Is Enesis Gender said friends name? :^p
Yes.
It can turn it into co2.
@@Aiel-Necromancer thx alot bro
@@Aiel-Necromancer Aquamation/Alkaline hydrolysis is a more environmentally friendly alternative to cremation; but less accessible, unfortunately
This is so neat! I would love to see more about super critical water reactors.
PFAS is used in a lot more than nonstick coatings.
Hi Savannah!
I love scientific solutions!
The co2 produced from breaking down pfas will be a rounding error to a rounding error compared to our normal GHG emissions.
I'm not worried about the CO2. Where is all that fluorine going? It doesn't just magically disappear.
I'm wondering about the energy cost to produce all that pressure and temperature.
It should be partially or entirely recoverable in the depressurization/cooling phase, especially if the oxidization can actually release extra energy.
@@absalomdraconis Fair enough. Thx.
Sub critical water at temperatures above 250 Celsius exhibits simular properties at much lower pressures. Hydrous pyrolysis, Wet Oxidation, & Thermal Depolymerazation are names used for these processes. The lower temperatures and pressures make them easier to implement but require reaction times between 15 to 30 minutes. This reaction has been used to break down everything ftom old tires and plastics to chemical waste. It is a sealed process to maintain required pressure.
Not really my place to promote but this is one of the coolest ideas I've come across as a young adult in the wastewater field. There is a company, 374 Water (scwo)-ticker- that is trying to take this to the real world. They are highly ambitious and I've actually seen one of their demo reactors here in Kokomo Indiana. They have a little way to go but given the right equipment and "fuels" these things could really take off. Pfas and other dissolved solids are a big deal and it's going to be extremely difficult to remove without some sort of process like this. These reactors can't handle normal "water" though, has to have a good source of fuel to keep it going. There is a lot to expand on this but it's here and it's real. Not perfect but very very cool 😎
Wow, that's fascinating! Thanks for the informational video on supercritical water :))
Wait, there is finally an option for removing PFAS?! Holy hell that is great news.
Yes !
All we have to do is heat all the world's water to 379°C at high pressure, and we're good :)
@@massimookissed1023 not to mention the greenwashing of injecting all the produced co2 into the ground. lol
Well, at least in our drinking and irrigation water. A tall order to be sure.
@@massimookissed1023 okay so hear me out... We just keep releasing greenhouse gases until we turn into Venus 2.0. High pressure *and* temperature!
@@massimookissed1023 Honestly, with the effects PFAS has on human health I would consider that a worthwhile effort.
Now if we can also replace the materials that need PFAS we can once and for all remove it instead of everyone having to suffer for eternity.
Brilliant, informative, interesting and downright fun
I thought fire water was whisky. You learn something new every day.
Super interesting video! Who would have thought you could burn things with water! Hopefully we can use this technique to clean up Duponts mess
we use it to clean clothes. dry cleaning is done using supercritical fluids though I believe they use CO2 not water.
Thank you
What about the energy needed to make this work at all? Because we all know how much energy it takes to heat water up and then you have to build that much pressure on top of that for every volume of fluid you are going to do this too.
Fast forward 1000 years to the SciShow episode that explains why Earth exploded from internal build-up of C-O2.
I love hearing about good news.
Fun facts from my favorite presenter.
Yay Savannah!
Steam is not the gaseous form of water; water vapor is. Steam is tiny droplets of liquid water suspended in the air.
Just saw Kyle Hill's video about those spamming ""science""" channels.
After reporting them i'm glad to come back to sanity X)
A similar process is used in (still) pilot plants where we half burn waste in order to produce biofuel.
Once the process is started, it is just a matter to continuously provide more waste and a fraction of the biofuel is used to maintain the cycle.
Yes, it still produces more CO2, but it is less problematic than the methane it would produce "naturally" in the dumps.
But we can also make polymers and substrate for fungi growth, for building for example, sequestering the CO2 into infrastructure.
Edit: we can burn almost anything in that process, too, much like in this video. Tires, pans, hospital waste, clothes, anything, really.
Metals can be taken away during the final stages of the burn and recycle Cadmium (extremely toxic), platinum, gold and Rare Earth.
Thats incredibly cool. Discoveries like this are a godsend and the future and thank you to the scientists who work tirelessly to deliver them everyday.
Fire dissolving and fire removing
There is fire at the bottom of the ocean
Under the fire, carry the fire
Remove the fire from the bottom of the ocean
Fire dissolving and fire removing
As always, GREAT VIDEO !
wait so there are 5 states? solic,liquid,gas,supercritcal,plasma? or is plasma something else? or is suprcirtical not a state?
Supercritical Water Oxidation also works on PFAS, and is also a good way to recycle interspecies waste when trading with aliens.
Oh, and a good way to destroy evidence if you're smuggling contraband.
What’s the difference between supercritical water and plasma state of water, or are they the same?
Wonderful for applications in space but this tech could be applied here on earth for a number of issues. Most of us will continue to live here for the decades foreseeable.
very interesting! great video. as it happens, you can set things on fire with superheated steam too, no need for leaving the gas phase ;)
Man, this water seems incredibly important
I hope it's not being wasted
"oh no ive accidently microwaved a clear cup of water beyond boiling"
welp no gotta make the best of it
*shits in cup
So if we start using this for waste disposal without sufficient support we'll all be in... hot water?
The reaction you describe sounds more like we'd be dissolving our waste, like with an acid, rather than burning it like with combustion, I'm assuming the word choice is due to the chemistry of the reaction?
Storing CO2 underground? Are we talking about Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)? Isn't that only considered somewhat viable for very large CO2 emitters, such as Oil and Gas companies? It would be very surprising if CCS was implemented for specific waste decomposition applications before there was enough abundance of resources to set up CCS affordably on small scales.
4:41 man I wish I could, it would save so much time! 😂
I'm guessing the "water toasters' and 'steam oven toasters' appearing on the market cook/brown using this, or related, process. Thanks for the explanation.
How are you heating the water to these high temperatures? Presumably without fire
I hope this works out, looking forward to real healthy water again!
One thing I want to add is that the systems I've seen are intended for hydrogen production rather than specifically to treat the water.
The oxygen is used in the pyrolysis (or is this one hydrolysis? I can't recall) and the outgoing products would be xO2 (CO2, SO2, etc) alongside non-oxidized H2 hydrogen pairs.
Which we then use into fuel that can produce even more of that clear drinking water we were talking about. Alongside the thermally treated, chemically inert water that was processed up to supercritical pressure/temps as well, of course. ;)
Do you mean Steam Gasification? Pyrolysis is basically just a thermal decomposition process; it doesn't need oxygen to do that since it is an inert process.
@@s0ul216 No, they're processes that involve high temperature water but operate under different parameters to produce different results.
I imagine it's mostly pressure and mechanical processes.
Generate steam -> Steam blasts hydrocarbon source -> Steam causes thermal decomposition and gas shift reactions.
Vs submerging the material in water and heating the whole thing up, then venting the hydrogen/CO2 that'd result.
It's different in the way hat hydrolysis of carbon-based matter into hydrochar is different from steam gasification with different chemical results.
Don't some advanced power stations already use water that's heated to supercritical or near state. I know I read that some heat water under pressure to the point where it is indistinguishable from steam? Do they just reach the critical point approaching supercritical state or achieve it?
Supercritical substances in general are very useful. Geothermal utilities are looking into supercritical CO2 as a way to get more heat out of very deep geothermal wells. It’s way more efficient at transferring heat than liquid water and any noxious heavy metals that it comes in contact with will have a harder time finding their way into groundwater deposits.
Cool thanks
Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. Without it all plant life dies. If being a greenhouse gas is what makes you call it a pollutant, then so is water vapor. Do you classify water as a pollutant also?
Undecided with Matt Ferrell covered a similar topic a year or two ago about how a European company is working with waste treatment facilities in Europe and the US to setup whats effectively a pressure cooker for sewage. Its supposed to have a similar effect as what is described here but they are able to control the resulting by-products based on the temp and time to make things like bio-coal and the ingredients to make other bio-fuels on top of breaking down those PFAS chemicals. It supposedly is supposed to replicate the process of how fossil fuels came to be made naturally only sped up to an absurd degree. It also limits the need for things like more complex filtration systems since all the organic material becomes more simple in the bio-fuel example or an outright filter itself in the bio-coal. You could literally turn waste treatment facilities into mini power plants with a steady "fuel supply" though not exact numbers were given to show whether it would be a power surplus or not.
Great video, but I have to ask, how on Earth is CO2 a pollutant?
"Oh my god, he's in the supercritical oxidation tank!"
5:12 I wish we could have plants here on earth too so it would be useful here to :(
Is it just a coincidence that difference between water's freezing point (0C) and absolute zero (-273C) and water's critical point (373C) and boiling point (100C) is 273 degrees? Or is there some physics behind it?
Celsius did base his scale on water after all; although he didn't know about the critical point.
I hate these non-stick pans, because you're not meant to cook with metal with them. I always cook with metal, it's just how I like to cook. (Sorry hotel pans.) I don't use non-stick pans at home... what was wrong with stainless steal and cast iron? I think we'd all be better off without non-stick.
Imagine a planet made entirely of water. With a supercritical core. Steamy atmosphere. Possibly a gas mini.
3 times hotter is not an accurate way to describe it unless we're using Kelvin, right? 2:32
Fascinating
First off, I just got an ad for cremation services after the video....
Second off, I highly doubt that there is enough pfas chemicals out there to have to worry about their carbon footprint when breaking them down with supercritical water. Now with bulk waste like microplastics, we'll definitely need to figure something out for that particular footprint
nice,however,pumping co² underground is a big mistake,what if it comes to the surface over time (and even faster because of an earthquake) these amounts would be catastrofic if they were released simultaniously,what about something that also breaks the co² bonds into its inert components?
So when are we gonna clean up Flint Michigan?
Wow, all news to me, thanks.
What happens if they increase the O2 content of the supercritical water? Can it increase the reaction efficiency or speed?
Actually a pretty cool episode!
Can SciShow PLEASE do a video on CO2 recapture technology??? @donutmedia recently did a video about Porche’s synthetic hydrocarbon fuel (E-Fuel) using ocean water and aqueous CO2. I would LOVE a more researched and thoroughly explained video on this process and I think it could really help with educating the public about the climate crisis!
Could this be used for the star trek Replicator/recycler technology?
does supercritical water oxydize plastics ? It could be a way to break it and get components backs to recycle things easier.
water goes super! on fire!
Can it be “bottled” or stored?
5:20 Feels like DC Arrowverse.
They could also just feed the sewage to the plants, like in a reed bed
And then you will have contaminated plants producing contaminated food. And that *_is not_* a good thing to have in space.
Now, what about using your brain once and a while?
Hard to scale that to the needs of large cities, nor does it eliminate pfa.
@swordphobic According to the Center for Alternative Technology the area for a reed bed is similar to that of a sewage treatment plant.
Im wondering if this supper critical water could be used to produce graphene. if it coul dissolve graphite then we can dilute carbon solution down to atom status
An interesting topic. I didn't realize that water's critical point was that low. That would seem to indicate that modern power plants are operating in the super critical regime, which is pretty cool. Or hot, actually. As an aside, "One crisis after another"... That's life in a world with WAY too many people for ya...
Yeah... Humanity could really use a couple generations of population decline.
I'm really curious, i know this question might be dumb but please if someone that is an expert on the field answer me ☺️
Why water don't ignite in high temperatures? I mean it has hydrogen and oxygen in it right?
Water is the product of burning hydrogen and oxygen! It's "already burnt". If you burn something containing carbon and hydrogen, which is most fuels, with oxygen gas, that creates carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O). If you burn pure hydrogen gas with oxygen and there's no carbon in the mix, you get only water.
I hate supercritical water because it does nothing else than complain over everything I do.
Something I've been wondering my whole life-- where do the bubbles in boiling water come from? It's like air bubbles magically appear at the bottom of the pot. Are they from water being broken apart into oxygen and hydrogen? I suppose I could've just looked it up at some point.
The bottom of pot is much hotter so water at bottom is gets boiled first it is then converted into water vapor they rise up as they are hot and less dense, on reaching top they burst. It does not break in hydrogen or oxygen it is still water but in gaseous state.
Cool I Never knew this possibility
Splitting water electrically burns very very well
what about Hydrothermal liquefaction or carbonization at lower temperatures? they seem much more promising on Earth because they require lower temperatures (less energy) and produce less CO2 and more useful byproducts like bio-derived crude oil and/or coal. The other big advantage of the lower temperature processes is that heavy metals mostly end up in the coal and nitrogen phosphorus and potassium for fertilizer all end up in the water where it can be easily concentrated into fertilizer when you purify the water.
Go Go Sci Show
Glad they found a way to get rid of those forever chemicals, but it seems like a tall order to pressurize an entire city's sewage to 217 atmospheres.
They should put the co2 byproduct in barrels and put the barrels in a separate supercritical water factory where there’ll be a machine that disposes of the barrels in supercritical water and repeating the process of putting the co2 byproduct in barrels forever
- I don’t know
pure sodium in normal water will produce a very hot reaction, tho on the explosive side of things
So all we have to do to destroy the harmful things we voluntarily created is *checks notes* "use enough energy to raise water to 700 degrees F". We are so good at this
Hmm, and water is a fairly good source of hydroge and oxygen, both fairly good oxidising elements.
This could be very promising to remove waste.
Did Savannah ever get a proper intro? I seem to remember them sort of just appearing in the shorts and they shifted slowly to host.
375c water at 200bars in s p a c e sounds neat.
Easier way to create fire with water: Throw cold water in a pan with hot oil. But really, great solution to trash.
So technically you could use deep geothermal wells as supercritical reactors with the added benefit that the CO² is already underground?! 🤔
You can also start fires with water and fluorine.
Superheated steam can ignite things
What becomes of the flourine in supercritical oxidation of pfas?
Hydrofluoric acid?
we are the "waste" she is referring to. look up aquamation. (as opposed to cremation). yes this is a real thing they do in many places.
maybe there is something here regarding "Greek Fire"?
That much heat is going to require a ton of energy. Water is particularly energy absorbing. Where's it coming from?
373 Centigrade is NOT "three times the temperature of root-pressure boiling water". You need to use the Kelvin scale, so 100C is 379K (if I remember correctly) and 373C is 652K, only approximately DOUBLE the temperature. Silly mistake, especially for a science channel.
3:38 The (supercritical water) oxidation of ammonium can’t yield any carbon dioxide because it doesn’t contain any carbon. At most it’ll yield nitrogen oxides (NOx), air pollutants.
hmmm so maybe there is still potential for life on a water world to still develop fire, or something of similar usefulness, and thus technology.
Hard for them to observe it naturally though