Turning carbon dioxide into liquid fuel. Scientists have discovered a new electrocatalyst that converts carbon dioxide (CO2) and water into ethanol with very high energy efficiency, high selectivity for the desired final product and low cost.

[u/Wagamaga]

https://www.anl.gov/article/turning-carbon-dioxide-into-liquid-fuel

[u/toalysium]

Agricultural machines are headed electric faster than people think. Even when farm diesel is tax free I'm still looking forward to covering my barn with solar panels and getting an electric tractor. The big thing is going to be swappable battery packs. Can't afford to wait 3-4 hours to charge a tractor and the majority of rural areas don't have ready access to 440v power so a system like a Tesla supercharger isn't an option. But really, if you're dropping $400,000 on a new combine then what's another $50,000 for extra battery packs in exchange for never buying fuel?

https://www.kubota.com/news/2020/20200115_2.html

[u/Bendetto4 → u/toalysium]

I didn't know that, I imagined the draw combined with the range needed for farm machinery would make it impractical

[u/toalysium → u/Bendetto4]

Range isn't really the issue, but rather constant high levels of torque. Take for instance these types of plows. About 19m wide and around 5,500kg and requiring at least a 400hp tractor. There's no physical possibility of hauling enough battery for a 12 hour day along with you, but even diesel isn't energy dense enough for that, that's why everyone has either a large truck or a trailer with a 500-1,000 gallon fuel tank. But if you have a barn large enough to store one of these and a combine (plus also probably a sprayer and a semi truck or two) you could slap 20-30kw worth of solar on the roof and instead of a fuel truck you'd get a truck with a small crane that can quickly swap batteries in the field.

https://www.caseih.com/northamerica/en-us/products/tillage/chisel-plow#0