121 lines
5.7 KiB
Plaintext
121 lines
5.7 KiB
Plaintext
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| File Name : CRITWATR.ASC | Online Date : 08/17/94 |
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| Contributed by : Bert Pool | Dir Category : ECOLOGY |
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| From : KeelyNet BBS | DataLine : (214) 324-3501 |
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| KeelyNet * PO BOX 870716 * Mesquite, Texas * USA * 75187 |
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| A FREE Alternative Sciences BBS sponsored by Vanguard Sciences |
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Norm, I know you and a couple of others will be VERY interested
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in this next message/article...> Bert
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From: John Powell
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To: All Msg #149, Aug-10-94 08:12:00
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Subject: Outrider Report: Supercritical Water
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.
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* Originally By: JimWils
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* Originally To: All
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* Originally Re: Outrider Report: Supercritical Water
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* Original Area: ParaNet(sm) Science on the Edge
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* Forwarded by : Blue Wave v2.12 OS/2
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.
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From: jimwils@aol.com (JimWils)
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Date: 6 Aug 94 14:37:01 GMT
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Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364)
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Message-ID: <32076d$9lh@search01.news.aol.com>
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Newsgroups: alt.paranet.science
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Outrider Report for August 14, 1994
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Supercritical Water:
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Superweapon in the War On Toxic Wastes
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by
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Jim Wilson
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.
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Imagine a chemical so powerful it destroys every known waste, even nerve gas.
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Now imagine this chemical is not only safe, but actually good for you to drink.
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.
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This seemingly magical elixir is no pipe dream. It not only exists, but exists
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in vast quantities, within a few hundred feet of every chemical plant and toxic
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waste site.
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The superweapon in the war on toxic wastes is water, albeit in a very unusual
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form. Everyone knows water can be a liquid, solid, or gas. Unless you've
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studied chemistry you may be unaware water can exist in a fourth state, as what
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scientists call a "supercritical" fluid.
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.
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Baron Charles Cagniard de la Tour, a French scientist, mixed the first batch of
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supercritical water in 1821. He heated water in a pressure cooker made from a
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sealed cannon barrel.
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.
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Today, Jurgen Steinle is conducting a similar experiment, using a steel
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reaction vessel fit with an ocean-liner style port hole. As an added precaution
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he has put his industrial-strength pressure cooker inside an explosion-proof
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testing chamber, in the basement of his laboratory at Germany's University of
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Karlsruhe.
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Eyes glued to two oversize gages, Steinle watches as the temperature climbs to
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705 degrees Fahrenheit and the pressure reaches 3,200 pounds per square inch.
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It was at these extreme conditions Baron de la Tour noticed the water stopped
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sloshing when he rocked the cannon. Too hot to remain a liquid, the pressure
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was too high to allow it to become a gas. It had become a supercritical fluid.
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In the decades that followed supercritical water was shown to exhibit several
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remarkable properties. Oil and water won't mix, oil and supercritical water
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will. Salts dissolve in liquid water; they settle out of solution in
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supercritical water.
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Steinle prepares to demonstrate an even more remarkable property. Supercritical
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water can cause hydrogen and carbon containing substances to "burn," without
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creating smoke or other wastes.
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"The reaction vessel is filled with a mixture is 30 percent methane and 70
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percent water," Steinle explains as he turns a valve connected to a green
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capped cylinder containing commercial-grade oxygen. "Now watch closely."
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A television set mounted along side the temperature and pressure gages shows
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the view through the port hole. A metal cylinder, about the size of a hockey
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puck, appears at the bottom of the screen. A narrow pipe, the oxygen line,
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pokes through its center.
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The valve opens. When the oxygen reaches the chamber, a jet of smokeless flame
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erupts. The methane, which most of us know as the main ingredient in the
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natural gas whose blue flame heats our morning coffee, burns for several
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seconds, then slowly shrinks and disappears.
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As demonstrations of high tech wonders go, it is tame stuff.
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It is what happens next that raises eyebrows. After cooling, a water sample is
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drawn from the reaction vessel and analyzed. Every molecule of methane has
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vanished. In its place is ultra-pure water and carbon dioxide, the gas we
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exhale as we breath.
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Supercritical water's ability to perform this chemical reaction without
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generating smoke or harmful residues has attracted the Pentagon's attention. It
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may be the ideal way to dispose one of the Cold War's more dubious legacies,
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some five million rounds of chemical weapons, including nerve gas. For the
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present, the shells, some of which are badly corroded, are stored in military
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warehouses. Conventional incineration leaves lethal residue.
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To speed the development of supercritical water disposal technology the
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Department of Defense and Department of Energy have funded more than a dozen
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projects. Participants include General Atomics Corporation of San Diego,
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California; Eco Waste Technologies of Austin, Texas; and Modell Development
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Corporation of Framingham, Massachusets.
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Executives for these companies are hopeful experience gained in disposing of
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nerve gas and other high risk wastes such as old rocket fuel and PCBs will
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speed the commercialization of supercritical water disposal technology.
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If they are correct, and the technology matures as promised, wastewater
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discharges from sewage plants and factories may someday be cleaner than
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premium-label bottled water.
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# # #
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(c) Copyright 1994. James Wilson. All rights Reserved.
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--- Blue Wave/QBBS v2.12 OS/2 [NR]
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* Origin: Absence of Evidence is not Evidence of Absence BBS (1:261/1201.0)
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