Probably the best oxymoron I've ever heard! But that is genuinely a term used in this interesting article from TechNewsWorld.
Whilst we are rapidly running out of sources of sweet light crude oil, our little planet has a surfeit of heavy crude, which is difficult and expensive to make easy use of. So the development of a process that turns heavy crude into useful light oil sounds like a major breakthrough, and could well extend the time that humanity has to continue to utilise petroleum based products as the primary fuel of our modern way of living.
Be interesting to understand just just what potential EnviROI such a process has though.
"Genoil considers its process that converts heavy oil into light oil as environmentally sound. Lifschultz tells me, "Genoil's upgrading technology not only converts heavy oil into light oil, but also removes over 90 percent of the sulfur and a majority of the nitrogen which cause greenhouse gases that pollute the environment. In that sense, Genoil makes the oil green, or at least greener.""
But to describe oil as 'green'! Sorry, that's one of the worst attempts at greenwash I've ever seen. In fact its complete boll**ks!
2 comments:
Genoil's process is by no means green, but it is greener than current technology that produces Coke (a coal-like substance) as a by-product. Coke is a toxic waste that must be disposed of or burned as we do coal. Genoil's process produces no Coke making it a "greener" solution than what is currently employed. Regardless of what the "greens" believe, over 90% of our energy needs will be provided by oil, coal, nucs, and natgas for the next 30 years.
Maybe a case of 'too 'er' is PR: to forgive refine':)
I can see some merit in both stances.
Whilst accepting the 'necessity' of a continued supply of Texas Tea to keep 'us' in the manner to which we have become accustomed, and nodding towards anything that is 'better than nothing' in this regard (with very necessary questions on actual enviROIs remaining), the point is that 'Green' without the suffix is a... stretch.
Even adding the 'er' kinda polishes the deal a tad more than it really deserves, though with enough context as to what it is being compared to, for now, it could, possibly, be a reasonable descriptor.
I guess some antennae might with reason be a smidge sensitive to attempts to oversell the colour as a sheen, and in a less than convincing manner?
It would seem more appropriate to pitch genuine techonological mitigations (of what are still less than optimal environemental actions) with a little less of a trowel. It seldom seems to work wel in this manner.
For instance, I have tended to view less than subtle ads from airlines regarding more fuel efficient engines with one eyebrow more than cocked, as the potential fallout from this in many ways admirable engineering achievement can be a lot more complex.
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