ALTERNATIVE TYPES OF TRANSPORTATION FUEL

What Can Replace the Automobile Fuel Source

to Reduce Carbon Footprint?

Michael Yao

RDF International School

Author's Note:

Michael Yao, Honors Thesis Class, RDF International School

Contact: michaelyao2001@gmail.com

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ALTERNATIVE TYPES OF TRANSPORTATION FUEL

Introduction

How is it reasonable to create a two-ton machine to carry one man and produce

greenhouse gases that will destroy the environment? My research topic is focused on how

to replace or change the modern car's fueling system so that we can minimize the carbon

footprint created by the transportation industry. For this paper, I will be mentioning

several ways that we can achieve this goal, such as advancing the fuel type, modifying

the vehicle and the transportation system, and changing how people think of

transportation. Most modern cars are powered by petroleum, a non-renewable and

expensive energy source that, when burned, produces an enormous amount of carbon

dioxide and other gases that are harmful to the environment. However, there are bio-fuels

and other replacements for petroleum. For example, hydrogen contains nearly 3.5 times

the energy generated by petroleum, and it does not produce greenhouse gases after

burning. Now, looking at the car itself, an engine that simply burns fuel to create a force

to push the pistons inside the combustion engine is outdated. There are already

companies making water-electrolysis engines that only need a little electricity and water

to run. Also, an Israeli company has made an aluminum air car-use battery that can run

for 1,600 km/charge while other normal lithium batteries for cars can only run for

600 km/charge.

Car engines are not the only products that are changing. A new type of jet fuel is

being researched and developed by companies. The fuel is similar to ethanol, but its basic

components are alcohol and fermented crops. This fuel is designed for commercial

aircraft. When it is burnt, it creates way less air pollution than burning gasoline. Also,

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when engines burn this type of fuel, they create less noise because there is less wasted air

inside the engine. Progress has been made on other modes of transportation too. On

January 1st, the Netherlands Department of Transportation and Traffic declared that all

Dutch trains now run on renewable energy generated from clean sources. Similarly, a

Japanese shipping company named Shin Aitoku Maru Usuki Pioneer claims that its ships

will use advanced sails to decrease the fuel consumption up to 25%. However, all the

renewable energy solutions have difficulties too. Different car engines need different

materials to handle the fuel's special properties, and some fuels are hard to transport and

produce. Commercial jets have to modify their jet engine to be able to use the new fuel,

which will cost the jet company $400,000 per engine. Although electric trains are more

energy-efficient, the maximum speed of the train is decreased because an electric tractor

cannot provide enough burst, the way a fossil fuel engine does. The same goes for ships:

although using renewable energy such as wind and solar power for ships has been proven

to be very possible, this method is way less time-efficient than a fossil fuel engine. It

takes up to 40% more time for a renewable energy ship to travel a distance than for a

fossil fuel engine to do it.

With these problems, scientists will require more than a day or two to reach the goal.

However, progress is being made, so the future might be closer to us than it seems.

Literature Review

Question 1: Why do we need to replace our automobile fuel source in order to reduce our

carbon footprint?

A carbon footprint is the environmental impact of a particular person's, object's, or

organization's lifestyle or operation, measured in units of carbon dioxide. Basically, it

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measures how much waste is created during production and usage. Most of the modern-

day greenhouse gasses are produced by vehicles, such as the burning of fossil fuel used in

cars and planes. So the effect on the amount of greenhouse gases produced should be

remarkably visible once the modern transportation system is changed. After the system is

changed, the rate of global warming will decrease, which will be of benefit to all humans.

Modern-day transportation might not be so modern when we consider its

contribution to overall energy consumption in the world. "How is 1 ton of metal to

transport 70 kg of the human body reasonable" (Christian. R., 2004)? Nowadays, most of

the energy we use comes from fossil fuel. In 2009, 16 terawatts of energy were used

worldwide, and 80% (12.8 TW) of it came from fossil fuels; 7.8 billion tons of

carbon dioxide were released into the atmosphere due to the combustion of those fossil

fuels. If we leave this situation unchecked, then by 2050, we will lose the ice sheet in

the West Antarctic and Greenland, which will raise the sea level and change the

thermohaline circulation (a sea current) that will lead to dramatic climate change. That is

something that definitely should not happen, but the increase in carbon released into the

atmosphere will be inexorable with such a huge energy consumption, so we need to

decrease the amount of fossil fuel burned by just not using it, which means we will need a

new transportation system because the modern day transportation system is built

to be dependent on fossil fuels. "Various scenarios to stabilize atmospheric CO2

concentrations at 450650 ppmv over the next few hundred years have been calculated,

and these show that total annual CO2 emissions from 2050 and onwards should not

exceed 6.0 GtC to stabilize the atmospheric CO2 concentration at 450 ppmv by 2100."

(Luis. C, Nicolas. A, 2013)

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If we decrease the quantity of fossil fuels used by modern transportation systems,

we will also decrease the amount of carbon created in energy generation. If we want to

save the ice sheets from melting, yearly we have to replace 20.8 gigawatts of fossil fuel

generated energy with carbon-constrained energy. Additionally, it will be necessary to

produce 0.29 TW of carbon-emission-free energy annually to support the growth in

energy consumption. The easiest way to replace and generate such a huge amount of

energy, compared to other energy-consuming factors (industry, residential utilization), is

to change how people travel by replacing fossil-fuel transportation with renewable-

energy transportation. This way, we can slow down and eventually stop climate change.

Today, biofuels represent about 2.7% of global transportation energy (0.12 TW), which

is dominated by ethanol (84.6 billion liters in 2011) and biodiesel derived from rapeseed

or soybean oils (19.0 billion liters in 2011). (Luis. C, Nicolas. A, 2013). However, there

are some substitutes for carbon-based fuels presented. Diesel consists of hydrocarbons

and small amounts of sulfur, nitrogen, and oxygen, so we can replace it with alternate

fuels, such as vegetable oil, biodiesel, Fischer-Tropsch (F-T), and dimethyl ether (DME).

As for gasoline, the four major constituent groups are olefins, aromatics, paraffin, and

narthexes: we can replace these with alcohol, natural gas, hydrogen, and electricity.

Moreover, most of these are renewable in some way, so they are clearly a better choice

than fossil fuels (Demirbas. A, 2014).

There are three types of impact on the environment, and transportation effects all

three of them. The first are direct impacts: the immediate consequence of transportation

on the environment, where the causes and effects are clear and well-understood.

One example of these are carbon dioxide emissions. Then are the indirect impacts, the

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secondary effects of transportation. They often have greater consequence than direct

impacts, but the relationships involved are often misunderstood and harder to clarify. As

an example, using the wrong type of fuel in automobile engines is indirectly linked with

some respiratory diseases. Last are cumulative impacts. These are the multiplicative

consequences of transportation impacts. It takes into account various direct and indirect

impacts. In the case of climate change, for example, its cumulative impacts have created

a lot of damage to the environment, and all of them are related to transportation. (Jean-

Paul R, 2015)

There are four factors in the environmental effect of transportation: the causes, the

activities, the outputs, and the results. For instance, in carbon emissions, the car needs

fuel to run, so it burns fuel, which is the cause. It burns fuel in the engine, which is the

activity. It releases carbon dioxide, which is the output. Lastly, the carbon dioxide flows

to the atmosphere and becomes a part of the layer of greenhouse gases, which is the

result. Also, transportation affects the quality of the environment; for example, air and

water quality are affected by chemical pollution from the burning of fossil fuels. A lot of

noise is produced by modern transportation that might damage an organism's physical

and psychological well-being. With all of those negative effects that modern

transportation has on the environment, humans should do something about it and make it

better, both for the environment and for us. "The structure of the transport network, the

modes used and traffic levels are the main factors of the environmental impact of

transportation. Networks influence the spatial distribution of emissions (e.g. centralized

versus diffuse networks), while modes relate to the nature of the emissions, and the traffic

the intensity of these emissions" (Jean-Paul. R, 2015).

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All in all, people depend on transportation. They have a need for a means of

transport that gives them freedom to exercise their needs and desires during

transportation. People have no time, are lazy, they cannot walk, they hate other people,

and enjoy driving. In other words, the reasons people use cars today are mostly

insufficient time, danger, laziness, entertainment, and privacy. However, we should not

let the environment accept the responsibility for humans' corrupt customs. Humans have

to step up and change things, and transportation is one of the most important factors to

human life. Humans, therefore, have to make major changes to the worldwide

transportation system.

Question 2: How can humans replace automobile fuel sources to reduce our carbon

footprint?

This decade, the main method of transportation remains cars: 80% of the energy

consumed in the transportation industry in 2016 was used by cars (Jamie. C,

2016). So, in order to answer this question, I will provide possible solutions for the

reduction of carbon footprints by cars. Cars produce a carbon footprint because they use

combustion engines that burn gasoline/diesel to push the pistons to move the wheels. If

the source of the fuel or the type of engine is changed, then the car will not produce

carbon footprints in fueling anymore. There are mainly three types of cars that

run on renewable energy: the electric battery car, the hydrogen fuel cell-powered car,

and the nitrogen engine car. All three have their own advantages and disadvantages. I will

explain each of them to answer the question.

Since a few years ago, electric cars have been getting more popular because of

their carbon-free emission and several other factors. For example, electric

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cars are low maintenance because they run on electrically powered engines, so there is no

need to lubricate the engines. Therefore, the maintenance cost of these cars is lower. The

buyer does not need to send it to a service station as often as they do with a regular

gasoline-powered car. (Rinkesh T, 2016) Second, electric cars do not produce as much

noise pollution as gasoline-fed cars. Electric engines tend to provide a smoother drive

with higher acceleration over a longer distance. The future for electric cars is also looking

good. First, the price of the electric car is dropping rapidly; the price has fallen by 65%

since 2010, and it looks set to halve again in the next decade. Also, one battery unit used

to cost more than $1000 in 2010, and now it only costs less than $400. (Jamie. C, 2016)

Second, governments support them. Starting from 2017, 10% of all parking lots built in

the EU have to have a charging station. The EU is already setting a good example of the

kind of changes that will be required. The Guardian reports that a new draft EU directive,

expected to be enacted in 2019, will demand that every new or refurbished house in

Europe will have a charging point for an electric vehicle. (Jamie. C, 2016) Third, there

are protests around the world claiming to decrease the number of fossil fuel vehicles,

even prohibit them. With those factors together, the market and position of electric cars

will be very positive in the future. However, on the other hand, there are also some

downsides for the electric car. Most electric cars only have a driving range of up to 100

miles before they need to be recharged, and a normal electric car takes around 4-6 hours

to get full charged. Additionally, an electric car's engine is not as powerful as a gasoline

engine, so most of the electric cars are two-seaters, which means there is less available

space in the car.

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Then, there are the hydrogen cars. Hydrogen is the simplest element in atomic

theory. It can be considered as a clean energy carrier similar to electricity. It can be

produced from other energy sources such as nuclear energy. There is natural hydrogen

too, but it is always connected with other compounds like water. Hydrogen has the

highest energy storage rate by weight of any standard fuel. Also, it has higher efficiency.

In some instances, it is cheaper to ship hydrogen by pipeline than sending

electricity by wire over long distances. (Richard K, 2009)

There are several methods to produce hydrogen for fuel use, but most of them

require fossil fuels, so the only really clean way to produce hydrogen is through

electrolysis, also known as water splitting. Electrolysis involves passing an electric

current through water to separate water into its basic elements, hydrogen and oxygen.

Hydrogen is then collected at the negatively charged port and oxygen at the positive port.

(Jeff W, 2016) Hydrogen produced by electrolysis is extremely pure and results in no

emissions since electricity from renewable energy sources can be used. However, it costs

a lot more than other methods. For a hydrogen-powered vehicle, the hydrogen is stored

inside the hydrogen fuel cell. Fuel cells convert the chemical energy in hydrogen directly

to electricity, with pure water and heat as the only by-products. Hydrogen-powered fuel

cells are not only pollution-free, but also exhibit 70% more efficiency when compared to

traditional combustion engines (Richard. K, 2009). Several car companies

have released hydrogen models, and these were already available for the public to buy in

2013. They are better than electric cars because they are also emission-free, they achieve

a higher mileage, and it only takes minutes to charge them, whereas electric cars

take hours to recharge. However, hydrogen cars have problems, too. The first is

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production. The hydrogen used in hydrogen cars must be 99.999% pure, which

means that they cannot use natural hydrogen. Instead, they can only use hydrogen made

through electrolysis, which decreases the production rate of the hydrogen.

The second problem is storage. Because hydrogen is so light, to fit hydrogen into a

reasonably-sized tank, it has to be squeezed into a denser form. First, it has to be

liquefied and chilled to almost absolute zero (this process also takes up lots of energy).

It then has to be compressed so that it can be stored in a heavy and expensive tank, which

means that the car's fuel capacity will be limited because of the size of the tank (Jeff. W,

2007)

Then there are problems with distribution too. Currently, most of the hydrogen is

transported via trucks or trailers, which are very inefficient in two ways. For every 100

miles the truck travels, it uses 7.3% of the hydrogen it carries. Also, a 50-ton vehicle that

can carry enough gasoline to refuel 900 vehicles could only carry enough hydrogen to

refuel 90 vehicles. One possible solution is to use pipelines. However, the purified

hydrogen brittles steel and causes corrosion to other common metals, so the pipeline and

storage tanks have to be specially built. There are 700 miles of hydrogen pipelines now

operating in the State, and each mile costs 1 million. The longest in the world is a 250-

mile line between Belgium and France. However, once the pipeline system is constructed,

it will be the cheapest way to deliver hydrogen. (Nichols. V, 2012) Last, refueling, in

the US, there are about 50 hydrogen refueling stations spread across the country, but the

number of gas vehicles has reached over 126'000 in 2016, and that is a ratio of 2520:1.

There are not enough stations to make the hydrogen car system even run.

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ALTERNATIVE TYPES OF TRANSPORTATION FUEL

However, a recent engine design breakthrough allows for a new idea to be formed

and built, nitrogen cars. A mixture of a small amount of water and methanol replaces the

expensive heat exchanger that is required in a nitrogen engine, making the entire

mechanical system work. Liquid nitrogen works similar to hydrogen as an energy carrier.

However, it is easier and cheaper to make. In America, liquid nitrogen sells for a tenth of

the price of milk. Also, it does not corrode metal. In terms of efficiency, it is similar to

electricity, but because a nitrogen engine does not have to cope with high temperature, its

engine can be fabricated out of alloy or even plastic. So, in terms of price, an average

nitrogen car costs about half that of an electric car. "A small amount of water and anti-

freeze (e.g., methanol) is injected into the cylinder just as the liquid nitrogen is drawn in,

causing it to boil and expand rapidlythereby forcing the piston down inside the

cylinder." (Peter D, 2012) If nitrogen vehicles can be built with a low overall cost and

rapid refueling capacity, then they can compete with the other two renewable energy cars

on the market.

Overall, all three seem to have a great future in zero-emission transportation, but

at the same time, all three have tough mechanical difficulties to overcome. Otherwise,

they will never work. In general, they all face one problem: material. All three need

some type of material for an engine part or a container, because the current ones do not fit

or work very well with the energy's properties. Also, if the right material is found, then

the price for the car will drop. Scientists think that, if this problem is solved, then the

zero-emission transportation industry will progress dramatically.

Question 3: What is some other progress humans have made on renewable energy

transportation?

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In response to my previous question, I explained three different types of

renewable energy cars and analyzed their advantages and disadvantages. However, there

are more transportation tools than just cars. People travel in various ways. In response to

this question, I will be mentioning other forms of transportation, such as airplanes, trains,

buses, and ships.

Alcohol, a type of organic compound that is mainly used in the food and medical

industries, could be a future type of jet fuel. The alcohol used in jet fuel is fermented,

then distilled from crops and fruits such as sugarcane, grape, corn, wheat, and other

products of agriculture. If alcohol-to-jet (ATJ) fuels are successful, this will be a huge

advantage for humans because of the wide availability of materials used to create the

fuel. Advocates of this idea claim that it has a way higher chance of being viable to the

market commercially because there is such a large quantity of raw material. (Kerry. R,

2015) However, critics argue that the energy needed to convert the material into ATJ fuels

neutralizes the benefit of burning it. Second, the amount of the material, global sugarcane

production, is close to two billion tons. On a global scale, sugarcane could produce 150

million tons of ethanol, but the Global jet fuel demand is 200 million tons and rising. So,

there might even be a shortage of ethanol fuels. Opponents also doubt that the cost of the

fuel can be reduced because, if it stays at the same price as now, most airlines

will be unable to afford the expensive fuel.

Even under such pressure, some airlines, such as Virgin Atlantic and Qatar

Airways, and even the US Department of Defense, have paid some companies to develop

and produce ATJ fuels. One such company, named Byogy

Renewables, is based in California. It claims to have produced the world's first 100%

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replacement for kerosene (fossil fuel for aircraft) by bolting on its back-end process to an

ethanol plant to convert the ethanol into jet fuel via catalytic synthesis of sugar. (Kerry. R,

2015) The chief executive of Byogy, Kevin Weiss, said that they had invented a process

that converts alcohol to jet fuel, while most other companies take the alcohol to someone

else to turn it into jet fuel. If future aircraft no longer require fossil fuels to generate

power, the world's total annual carbon emission will be decreased by 4%. That was nearly

800 million tons of carbon dioxide in 2016. As renewable energy technologies progress,

more and more innovation and inventions will help to create a zero-emission world

(Kerry. R, 2015).

Formerly, trains were one of the most useful forms of transportation in the world.

However, a commercial train uses around 700KW/h at a speed of 200km/h. So the carbon

footprint of trains is huge, and they also have other disadvantages, such as loud noise.

However, these disadvantages can be fixed. A year after the Conference of Parties

21st (COP21) climate conference, the Netherlands Transportation and Traffic Department

announced that all electric trains on the Dutch train network would operate on renewable

energy starting from January 1, 2017, which is a year earlier than originally envisaged

(Quintus. V, 2016). That is 1.4 TW per year for the energy used. Also, instead of using

traditional electric generators, 95% of the trains' energy will come from windmills. One

windmill running for one hour can power a train for 120 miles. Electric locomotives do

not have conventional engines.' The way electric trains works is slightly different from

electric-powered automobiles. Rather, they act like components in an electric circuit. Rail

networks source this electricity from the grid, and just like for our homes, it is transmitted

to them via high-voltage lines. (Laurie W, 2017) There are two main options for the

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electricity to get on the train. The first is an onboard energy storage system, like a battery

or cell unit. The second is an extra wire or rail that has direct contact with the train and

has electrical currents flowing through it all the time. That is how the Dutch railroad

keeps the system working with a daily passenger count up to 600'000. In spite of reaching

its 100% green goal, the department is still continuing on their energy-saving program

with investments in things like a more efficient traction system and lighter train design. If

this technique can be used worldwide, then it could save up to 2.7% of total energy usage

annually.

In 2010, a company in southern China designed a vehicle that functioned as a bus.

However, this "bus" is nearly 8 meters tall and 6 meters wide and can carry more than

1'100 passengers each time. Also, this bus does not require any elevated tracks nor

extensive tunneling. (Bettina W, Andrea D, 2012). Its passenger cabin is located above

the driving lane while the underside of the bus is hollow, allowing cars to drive through

it. It travels at an average speed of 40 kilometers an hour. One of these special buses

could replace up to 40 single-layer conventional buses, potentially saving 860 tons of fuel

per bus every year. Moreover, it only costs 1.1 million US dollars for one bus and 25

miles of route facilities, which is about one-tenth of what it costs to build a subway of the

same length. In 2019, around 119 miles of road in the Beijing region will be built with

this brand-new bus system.

The world's commercial and merchant fleet consists of around 120'000 ships.

They consume about 270 million tons of fuel annually. This results in the emission of

around 34'000 tons of carbon emission per ship every year. (Felix. B, 2015) Besides, 90%

of world trade are done by shipping and the world's shipping tonnage loaded annually

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tripled since the 1970s. Carbon dioxide emission from shipping is estimated to be over

7% of the global total number. It also consists of a major source of air pollution over

land, especially around the ports and coastal cities. A US company named Eco-marine-

power has developed a system named Aquarius. The system is meant to reduce ship fuel

consumption by up to 40%. The system works like a multi-layer energy generator; it has

solar panels lying on the deck of the ship, and then, under the deck, it has a hydro turbine

connected to the propeller. It generates electricity from the waves. There are other

possible solutions too. For example, the Japanese ships Shin Aitoku Maru and Usuki

Pioneer used advanced fabricated sails. They claimed that it decreased their fuel

consumption by nearly 25%. They called their concept sustainable shipping. (Linus M,

2016) However, if the world shipping fuel consumption is left unchecked, the carbon

emission might even triple.

In conclusion, all of the transportation types I mentioned have different ways of

improving on renewable energy usage. If all of the solutions are used, then the emission

from transportation fueling will be decreased by at least 30%.

Discussion

My entire paper explains why human beings should change their automobile fuel

source and how they can transition from using fossil fuels into a zero-emission energy

era. I have mentioned some of the current statuses of this progress. In the

discussion that follows, I will explain my thoughts on the topic along with what energy

source I think will suit the transportation industry as the best primary energy source.

In Question 1, I explained what carbon footprint is and made a brief report on

world energy consumption and the environmental impact of transportation. Sometimes,

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carbon footprint means more than just a measure of carbon dioxide emitted. It is more a

trace of a person's life. If you look at a person's carbon footprint, all of his or her life and

personal usage will be revealed, because nobody can have a zero-carbon footprint.

Everything you do results in some carbon dioxide emissions. For example, even bottled

water's carbon footprint might be much more complicated than you thought. It starts

even before the bottling factory. The bottle that contains the water is made of plastic, and

creating plastic produces carbon dioxide from both the chemical reaction and the factory's

power usage. Then to the bottling factory, where they collect the water and fill it into the

bottles: that process, too, uses electricity, which is mostly generated from burning fossil

fuels, resulting in more carbon dioxide emissions. Next is transportation: the trucks that

pick it up at the factory and deliver it to supermarkets or grocery stores burn more

gasoline that creates emissions. Then you buy it from shops that run on electricity.

However, the carbon footprint does not end there. After it is finished and you throw the

bottle away, the bottle will be reprocessed and sent back to the bottle factory as raw

material or burnt at a garbage disposal site. Both processes create carbon dioxide

emissions. Thus, even the tiniest action you take might leave a long trail of carbon

dioxide. That is why knowing the carbon footprint of something is useful. For my topic,

because any automobiles need fuel, that fuel is usually fossil fuel. If fossil fuel is replaced

by other renewable energy, then the carbon footprint of that automobile will be lessened

because it is not directly producing carbon dioxide emissions from its fuel anymore. Of

all the energy we use worldwide, 80% comes from using fossil fuels. To keep carbon

dioxide emission in homeostasis in 2050, at least 20.8 gigawatts of energy used for

transportation have to be made from renewable energy sources yearly, with a growth rate

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of 3.5%. (Christian R, 2014) With those statistics, it is easy to tell that humanity is facing

a severe emission challenge. In 2016, only around 4% of the energy used in

transportation was renewable. I think it is time for humans to face this problem seriously

and work together to change it.

In Question 2, I compared three types of different renewable energy cars. All three

of them have different characteristics. So I will explain what each of their advantages is.

First is electric cars; they are the most common renewable energy car currently. This is its

first advantage. It is the easiest to gain acceptance from the customer, even if it has little

advantages on the technological level. It has an average price and is easy to refuel, and

it is the first type of renewable energy car available for the public to purchase. It needs

less technological breakthrough to be improved, so it is easier to develop new generations

of electric cars than the other two. Most of the time, an electric car is designed to be used

in a city, and its main customer is a young person who wants to try new things. The next

is the hydrogen car. This concept came out a few years after electric cars, so only a few

cities have facilities for refueling hydrogen cars, such as Los Angeles. However, it is the

only concept where the car is truly zero-emission because all it needs is water. A

hydrogen engine separates the hydrogen molecule from any types of water, and it only

creates a by-product of oxygen. It is also the most fuel efficient car too because hydrogen

has the smallest volume and its refuel speed is also the fastest. It is also the most efficient

engine of them all, bringing the percentage up to 70% more when comparing energy

efficiency to traditional fossil fuel engines. Finally, there are nitrogen cars. These are only

possible because of a recent technological breakthrough that allows nitrogen fuel to be

cooled down without a complex heat exchanger. A nitrogen engine works similarly to a

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combustion engine. It uses nitrogen inside the piston to push the piston. However, the

engine is connected to a nitrogen tank instead of a motor. Previously, engines could not

make the nitrogen expand enough to push the piston at high speed. Then a genius

engineer named Peter Dearman created a mixture of water and methanol. When this

mixture comes into contact with liquid nitrogen, the nitrogen expands in seconds to push

the pistons, making the car move forward. Because a nitrogen car does not generate any

heat from the engine, it can even be made from plastic, and the only product of burning

nitrogen is a slight residue of water. Imagine a future car factory that no longer needs

workers, just hundreds of 3D printers and robotic arms manufacturing cars that sell at the

same price as sports bicycles cost now. So, in the future, there might be a diverse

transportation system featuring three different types of car that run on different fuels,

instead of the current situation where 99% of cars run on fossil fuels.

In question 3, I mentioned other types of transportation, like aircraft and train.

They might affect our daily transportation less than cars, but they are very crucial on

different levels. An aircraft produces the same amount of carbon dioxide emission as 336

average four-seater cars when traveling the same distance of 500km. (Grant. S, 2010)

Recently, a new type of jet fuel was invented. It is made from fermented crops and sugar.

It is called Alcohol-to-Jet fuel. It is a little less energy efficient than gasoline, but it is

renewable and can be generated even from food waste with the right amount of sugar.

The Netherland Transportation and Traffic Department has recently announced that all of

the Dutch trains now run on electricity generated from clean sources, such as windmills

and solar panels. How that goal could be achieved a year earlier than

expected is very impressive, especially when the Dutch train system has to encounter

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600000 passengers every day. Shipping has always been a big carbon dioxide releaser; it

has created 7% of the world's total carbon dioxide emission. There are mainly two

methods to decrease that percentage. First, there is a shipping system such as the

Aquarius, which uses multiple ways, such as solar panels and a hydro turbine to generate

enough power to run the ship. The second method is to use additional add-ons that help

the ships to decrease their energy consumption. The Japanese shipping company Shin

Aitoku Maru Usuki Pioneer, for example, has added sails to their cargo ships,

decreasing their fuel consumption by 25%. I think that if both methods were applied,

more energy could be saved. But there are currently no technologies that allow ships to

be 100% emission-free, mainly because of the size of the cargo ships and the large

amounts of cargo they carry.

To summarize, my essential question was, 'What can replace automobile fuel

sources in order to reduce our carbon footprint?' There are many other forms of energy

that could replace fossil fuels, but I think nitrogen would be the best, due to the following

points. Firstly, nitrogen is everywhere: 78% of the Earth's atmosphere is nitrogen, and

humans are not making proper use of it. If we could use this nitrogen properly, humans

would no longer have to worry about not having enough energy. Secondly, nitrogen is

safe: it does not require special containers for storage. Thirdly, nitrogen is very cheap to

make and buy: in the United States, nitrogen costs about $0.16 per liter. This is about 60

times cheaper than AAA gasoline. Overall, nitrogen is the most efficient zero-emission

energy source available. I think it is only a matter of time before nitrogen becomes

mankind's primary source of energy.

Conclusion

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ALTERNATIVE TYPES OF TRANSPORTATION FUEL

For conclusion, I think right now it is a vital time for human to make changes to

the transportation system. The modern cars that run on gasoline no longer fit the Earths

environment because they are creating severe pollution to the environment. Instead,

human should use renewable energy engines such as hydrogen, nitrogen, or electric

engine. Also, the car should not be the only one that is changing. Other transportation like

Aircraft, ship, buses should change into using renewable energy source too. A future

research topic on this might be how human can modify the current transportation system

in order to reduce the carbon footprint of transportation

Acknowledgement

This thesis would not have been possible unless of the help from my teacher and

supervisor Dr. Carroll. She is always with me and guides me through difficulties and led

me on to the right track during the writing process. I am also indebted to many of my

classmate who supported the entire time. We worked together and was eventually

conquered all of the challenges.

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Appendix A

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ALTERNATIVE TYPES OF TRANSPORTATION FUEL

A graph showing how the hydrogen fuel cell convert water into hydrogen (U.S. Dept. of

Energy, 2013)

Appendix B

Future hydrogen energy Infrastructure (U.S. Dept. of Energy, 2013)

Appendix C

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ALTERNATIVE TYPES OF TRANSPORTATION FUEL

A graph showing the price of battery packs during 2010-2015 (The Guardian Reports,

2016)

26