Homo sapiens

Chapter 39 Sponge

Biomaterials Laboratory.

Quinine Mark, director of the scientific research office, and Pasteur (soldier), director of the management office, were also waiting for Li Qingye's arrival at the door.

This laboratory specializes in the study of biological materials. They had received a special material from Calagua Island some time ago, and they have almost completed their research at this time.

Li Qingye, who came from the Methanogen Laboratory, read the research report in his hand.

"You guys did a great job."

Quining said excitedly: "Boss, the sponge you provided is really great. If it can be mass-produced or synthesized artificially, it may be able to change the current industrial structure."

The sponge he mentioned is actually a genetically recombinant organism.

The body of this genetically modified sponge is a brand-new nanostructure. This is a brand-new variety cultivated by Li Qingye by combining biology, nanomaterials, and crystallography. He named this special nanostructure - crystal storage resonance hole. .

The function of crystal storage resonance holes is to press water and gas into its nanostructure through a certain pressure, turning it into special crystal water.

So what is the use of this crystal sponge composed of crystal storage resonance holes?

Its purpose lies in the fact that it can press in gas. 1 cubic meter of crystal sponge can press in 460 to 500 cubic meters of methane or other alkane gases.

The critical value of this compression pressure is only 3.7 times atmospheric pressure.

Once the gas is pressed into the crystal sponge, a relatively stable unit cell state will be formed. Even if the ambient temperature reaches hundreds of degrees Celsius, the gas stored in it will not be released. Its critical point release temperature is 148 degrees Celsius. above.

However, there is another characteristic of crystal storage resonance holes, that is, at a specific resonance frequency, the stability of its unit cell will rapidly decrease, thereby releasing the gas stored in it.

This gives the crystal sponge the function of storing and releasing gas at a low cost.

You must know that the liquefied natural gas ships (LNG) currently on the market are not only extremely expensive to build, but also have high operating and maintenance costs.

The liquefied natural gas in LNG ships uses ultra-low temperatures to liquefy methane gas. During the transportation process, low temperatures (-162 degrees Celsius) must be ensured throughout the transportation process, and the risk is extremely high.

1 cubic meter of liquefied natural gas can be converted into 625 cubic meters of gaseous natural gas.

The crystal sponge is 1 cubic meter and can store 460 to 500 cubic meters of gaseous methane.

In terms of the unit storage capacity of the two gases, LNG is slightly better; however, crystal sponge can be stored at normal temperature and pressure, while LNG needs to be kept at a low temperature of -162 degrees Celsius at all times.

This reflects the advantages of crystal sponge.

After all, the cost of building a LNG ship is very high. Take the Chinese-made Dapeng as an example. Its cost is as high as US$160 million and it can transport 147,000 cubic meters of LNG at one time.

The cost of a Panamax transport ship with a carrying capacity of 4,500 standard containers is only about US$70 million.

Usually the volume of a standard container is 24 to 26 cubic meters, and 4,500 standard containers is 108,000 to 117,000 cubic meters.

What's more, LNG ships also face another problem. Because the LNG they transport is different from ordinary cargo, they require special port handling and storage.

If crystal sponge is used as a storage container, there is no need for an overly complicated professional port, and other container ships can also be used for transformation.

However, Li Qingye is not ambitious at this stage. Homo sapiens company has no plans to enter the natural gas carrier industry. The main reason is that the water is too deep and it is easy to be targeted by the five gangsters.

Moreover, the production of crystal sponges is insufficient. Even with the use of growth hormones and nutrient solutions, one acre of seafield can only produce about 200 to 300 cubic meters of crystal sponges per year.

For a short period of time, it can only be supplied to Homo sapiens for internal use.

Now that the Homo sapiens company wants to build a batch of methane plants, it needs crystal sponges to make storage containers, which can save a lot of costs.

A gaseous methane storage tank at normal temperature and pressure takes up a large area and the cost is also high;

Not to mention LNG storage tanks, coupled with a lot of supporting low-temperature maintenance equipment, gasification equipment, transportation pipelines, etc., it is obvious at a glance that they are expensive and very dangerous. Once an operation error occurs, , maybe the entire factory will go to heaven together.

Regarding crystal sponge storage tanks, according to research by Quining et al. and the Production Technology Department.

To manufacture a crystal sponge storage tank, in addition to the core material crystal sponge, you also need a shock absorption and barrier layer, a flame-retardant steel shell, a sound wave generator, an electronic control system, a pressurized injection pump, a one-way air valve, a safety valve, Sirens and pipes.

The technical difficulty of these things is not great. The only thing with technical content is actually the production and deep processing of crystal sponges.

In fact, Li Qingye's main purpose in developing these things is not to make money, but for energy security.

Luzon is a place with scarce energy resources.

There are only a few small coal mines and natural gas mines within its territory, and no oil fields worth exploiting.

Now the thermal power plants of the subsidiary Jade Energy have to import thermal coal from Java and Australia. It is extremely unreliable to rely solely on imports of energy.

Since natural energy minerals are scarce, Li Qingye found another way and directly used biogas as the core energy source.

As for whether biogas can meet Luzon's needs, Li Qingye, who masters biotechnology, is very confident.

The efficiency of the recently developed genetically modified methane bacteria in decomposing organic matter to produce methane is about 2.7 times higher than that of the current natural strains, and does not require other auxiliary strains. The genetically modified methane bacteria can complete the decomposition of organic matter by themselves.

The reason why the efficiency can be improved so much is because the energy conversion chain is shortened, the reaction time is also shortened, and the continuous energy decrease during the long-term multiple conversion processes is avoided.

Genetically modified methane bacteria can directly decompose organic matter, which reduces the waste of energy.

Moreover, the organic matter that can be decomposed by genetically modified methane bacteria includes not only animal excrement, animal and plant carcasses, but also some man-made organic matter, such as the famous plastic products.

In this way, Jade Energy can build garbage recycling plants near various cities, and then send the biomass waste and plastic products for fermentation and decomposition, which not only reduces pollution and waste, but also obtains methane.

In addition, it can also store factory waste from surrounding areas, crop waste from farms, and manure from livestock farms.

Through this model, regional energy self-sufficiency can basically be achieved.

If there is an emergency, the Eucheuma starch produced by Haitian can also be used as a raw material for methane production.

In today's human society, energy is not just as simple as power supply and heating, but also involves food security.

If the Homo sapiens company wants to become a giant company that dominates the future of mankind, it must not have any shortcomings. Energy plays a vital role in the entire industry chain.

Promoting Luzon’s energy self-reliance is one of Homo sapiens’ next strategies.

After inspecting these laboratories, Li Qingye was relatively satisfied with the current progress of each project, just as he was preparing to return to Calagua Island.

Chen Jianxiong's feedback from Manila made him stop in his tracks.

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