Inputting the string “sodium hydroxide scrubber
automobile” to the automatically ANDing Google patent search system returns 318
hits, but the great majority are for industrial processes and the documents do
not include the word “automobile.” We
wonder why they were included in the output, but such is the nature of Google
“ANDing.”
Where a true "AND" searching process would only return an entry
that included all four elements, "sodium, hydroxide, scrubber and
automobile" the Google version produces all with any of the elements.
Thus, there were only two solid hits
in the entire list. It is amazing Google cannot get this right.
Patent 3,853,484 calls for the use of sodium hydroxide
solution or the molten material as the apparatus uses a Venturi vacuum pump
to spray the absorbent into the exhaust gas stream. The product solution is recycled continually
with no indication of when it is to be changed so the device would appear to have
a limited operational life with no way of determining when the absorbent was
exhausted. It is thus not a practical
system and especially so where the hydroxide is recycled in a way that will release the CO2 in the apparatus where it will rejoin the exhaust gas!
Patent 3,909,206 deals with air intake for fuel cells
as it is claimed carbon dioxide interferes with the operation of such cells and
several exotic hydroxides are called for in this application. Sodium
hydroxide is by far the cheapest and therefore
the preferred one used in industry. This scrubber is not
designed to capture carbon dioxide for sequestration and does not
relate in any way to SCAF.
