Homo sapiens

Chapter 39 The Sponge
Biomaterials Laboratory.

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

This laboratory is dedicated to the study of biological materials. They have received a special material from Caragua Island some time ago, and they have almost completed the research at this time.

Li Qingye, who came from the methanogen laboratory, finished reading the research report in his hand.

"You did a good job."

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

The sponge he mentioned is actually a genetically recombined organism.

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

The function of the crystal storage resonance hole is to press water and gas into its nanostructure through a certain pressure to become special crystal water.

So what is the use of this crystal sponge composed of crystal storage resonance holes?
Its purpose lies in the point that it can be pressed into the gas. 1 cubic meter of crystal sponge can be pressed into 460-500 cubic meters of methane or other alkane gases.

The critical value of this compression pressure is only 3.7 times the 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. The critical point release temperature is 148 degrees Celsius. above.

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

This allows the crystal sponge to store and release 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 of the liquefied natural gas ship liquefies methane gas through ultra-low temperature. During the transportation process, the low temperature (-162 degrees Celsius) must be guaranteed throughout the process, and the risk is extremely high.

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

The crystal sponge is 1 cubic meter, which can store 460-500 cubic meters of gaseous methane.

In terms of the unit storage capacity of gas, liquefied natural gas is slightly better; but crystal sponge can be stored at normal temperature and pressure, and liquefied natural gas needs to be kept at a low temperature of -162 degrees Celsius at all times.

This is the advantage of crystal sponge.

After all, the cost of building a liquefied natural gas ship is very high. Taking the Dapeng manufactured by Huaguo as an example, its cost is as high as 1.6 million U.S. dollars, and it can transport 14.7 cubic meters of liquefied natural gas at one time.

The cost of a Panamax transport ship with a carrying capacity of 4500 standard containers is only about US$7000 million.

通常一个标准集装箱的体积为24～26立方米，4500个标准集装箱就是10.8～11.7万立方米。

What's more, liquefied natural gas ships also face another problem, because the liquefied natural gas they transport is different from ordinary cargo, and requires special port loading, unloading and storage.

If crystal sponges are used as storage containers, there is no need for too complicated professional ports, and other container carriers can also be used for transformation.

However, at this stage, Li Qingye has no ambitions. Homo sapiens has no plans to enter the natural gas carrier industry. The main reason is that the water in it is too deep, and it is easy to be targeted by the five hooligans.

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

For a short period of time, it can only be used internally by Homo sapiens.

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

The gaseous methane storage tank at normal temperature and pressure occupies a large area and the cost is not low;

As for the liquefied natural gas storage tank, let alone a large number of supporting low-temperature maintenance equipment, gasification equipment, pipelines, etc., it is very expensive and very dangerous at first glance. Once there is an operation error , Maybe the whole factory will go to heaven together.

In terms of crystal sponge storage tanks, according to the research of Quining et al. and the Department of Production Technology.

To manufacture a crystal sponge storage tank, in addition to the core material crystal sponge, it also needs shock absorption and barrier layers, flame-retardant steel shells, sound wave generators, electronic control systems, pressurized injection pumps, one-way air valves, safety valves, Sirens and pipes.

The technology of these things is not very difficult, and the only thing with technical content is actually the production and deep processing of crystal sponges.

In fact, the main purpose of Li Qingye's research and development of 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 in its territory, and there are no oil fields worth exploiting.

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

Since natural energy minerals are scarce, Li Qingye found another way to directly use biogas as the core energy.

As for whether biogas can meet the needs of Luzon, Li Qingye, who has mastered biotechnology, is very confident.

Recently developed genetically modified methanogens can decompose organic matter to produce methane with an efficiency about 2.7 times higher than the current natural strains, and do not need other auxiliary strains, the genetically modified methanogens can complete the decomposition of organic matter by themselves.

The reason why so much efficiency can be improved is because the energy conversion chain is shortened, and the reaction time is also shortened, which avoids the continuous decline of energy during the long-term multiple conversion process.

Genetically modified methanogens can directly decompose organic matter, which reduces energy waste.

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, Emerald Energy can build waste recycling plants near various cities, and then send the biomass waste and plastic products to fermentation and decomposition, which reduces pollution and waste, and can also obtain methane.

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

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

In case of 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 industrial chain.

Promoting Luzon's energy self-improvement is one of Homo sapiens' next strategies.

After inspecting these laboratories, Li Qingye was relatively satisfied with the current progress of each project, just when he was about to return to Caragua Island.

The news that Chen Jianxiong fed back from Manila made him stop.

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(End of this chapter)