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Faking photosynthesis

Japanese chemists have come one step closer to solving the greenhouse gas problem, by converting carbon dioxide into something useful to industry.

A team from the Institute for Molecular Science in Myodaiji, Japan, has devised a way to convert carbon dioxide (CO2) into acetone, a solvent used extensively in industry.

Carbon dioxide is an incredibly stable molecule and, at the moment, the only real hope for eliminating it is through photosynthesis, where plants convert the gas into food. The Japanese team hopes to artificially convert CO2 into a useful fuel, but the method is still too inefficient and expensive for industrial use.

"That sums up the main problem with this type of process - finding an energy source that doesn't produce more carbon dioxide than it removes," said CSIRO scientist Dr John Lowke, leader of an Australian team investigating artificial photosynthesis.

The Japanese method, which relies on electrolysis, uses electric power and almost certainly the generation of the power would emit more CO2 than it eliminates, said Dr Lowke.

"Trees use sunlight, and solar energy is the great hope - the problem is how to harness it".

Dr Lowke's team is working towards a solar industrial system that can attack carbon dioxide as it's formed at power stations.

"It's pretty hard to compete with trees, but they take twenty years to grow. Maybe in ten years we'll have an industrial system that can 'fix' carbon dioxide into food or fuel".