多相系中での電極反応のキネティックス評価法

概要

Utilization of energy is the essence of the human being’s evolution. The way that people can utilize the energy directly defines the technological level of the certain civilization. From the very beginning of the human being, only the human force could be used. The power of a good fitness adult is range about 75-150 watts, and the burst of an elite bicycle athlete could reach to 1000 watts [1]. For our ancestor, because of the limited energy utilization, the population of a group is limited, the range of their activation is limited. No big and complex society can be built. Fire using is a milestone of the human evolution that ignites the burnable and releases the energy inside all kinds of the fuels, from where, mankind steps into a new era [2]. Using fire greatly increased the size and complex of the human society [3]. Fire using allows raw edible can be cooked which increased the longevity of pre-paleolithic human being [4]. Also, the fire provided better shelter to defense the invasive species [5]. Capable for manipulating fire made a great leap of the human civilization. During the evolution of the human being, our ancestor managed to learn husbandry [6]. The force of the bovid and horse thereafter have been utilized. With the help of the bovid force, heavy plough which cannot be pulled by human can be used in the field. Human being now can exploit a large of vast land for the farming. More food can be generated, and the size of the society increased [7]. After taking control of the horse, it can be added into human arsenal that the warfare changed accordingly [4].

Thousands of the years, human gradually developed to control all kinds of energy, with the capability improving, more power is available to alter the environment surround us, the bigger shelter that we can build, the more food that we can harvest and the more time for leisure that we can enjoy. From the antiquity to pre-industrialization, the power exerted from the creature was predominately used. Power generated from human’s muscle was transferred to wielding hummer to forge weaponries and tools; power generated from domestic cattle’s muscle was pulled the plough in the farmlands to provide corn and wheat; power generated from horse’s muscle was driven by the rider to transport information between place to place. The way of human utilize energy reshaped the human society. All the better things were achieved by using more energy and higher quality energy. In other word, energy is equal to civilization.

Industrial Revolution was the sign that human begin to massively use the fossil fuel, which is mainly the coal [8]. After a longtime human society development, the population increased all around the world. The large population generated a large demand of the common goods. Iron and textile were the most important resource that requires intensive labour to obtain. From 1760 to 1840, the demand of the product increased, in European and North America, hand production method assisted with water mill and wind mill gradually in arrears of the needs. At about 1840 the Industrial Revolution began in Great Britain. The steam driven machinery generated extremely large amount of energy, provided large amount of force for machinery, in high quality, to the industrial manufacturing. The era of steam power began. By the time of mid-1800, The Great Britain became a leading commercial nation in the world [9]. Large amount of the industrial product exported oversea. The civilization of the human being was dramatically developed, and the social division subdivided. Suddenly, large bulk of wooden charcoal was replaced by shiny black rock. To 1800s’ surprise, the black rock releases the same amount heat only has one fiftieth volume comparing to the original wood. Also, the annoying and suffocating smoke largely reduced. Everyone eulogized this magic black rock and called it “coal” or “miracle black gold”. It is amazing that from Neolithic until now, coal already been used for 12000 years. Great Greek philosopher Theophrastus wrote that ‘Among the materials that are dug because they are useful, those known as anthrakes [coals] are made of earth, and, once set on fire, they burn like charcoal. They are found in Liguria ... and in Elis as one approaches Olympia by the mountain road; and they are used by those who work in metals.’ The coal was the magic fuel at that time, but now the residue after combustion became to the largest problem that human is facing. Carbon dioxide is the reason of the abnormal temperature increasing all around the world and extreme weather.

Not only the consuming coal generate CO2, consuming all kinds of the fossil fuel generate CO2. As it has been mentioned above, energy equal to civilization, for a better society and prosperity, we human want to use more and more energy. The energy supply always failed to meet the requirement that the deprivation of the fuel was long-standing discussed topic. William S. Jevons, English economist and Logician ingeniously recognized the so called “Jevons Paradox”, and he has pointed out this anthropologic phenomenon, that is, with the progression of technology, the efficiency of using a certain resource increased, the rate of the resource consumption dose not decrease as the expectation, instead it increased [10]. Jevons Paradox successfully explained some of the energy usage induced environmental problems, the greenhouse gas emission problem, the energy security problem and the depletion of the fossil fuel problem. With the increasing fossil fuel efficiency and the utilization technology, the annually consumption is increasing as well. It is not strange that every year fossil fuel consumption increased, the CO2 emission is increased, and the average temperature is escalating [11]. It is not explicit but firmly true that by optimizing the process of fossil fuel utilization we cannot stop the emitting CO2 to the atmosphere. After the Industrial Revolution, the oil began to be used in the industrial manufacturing and fuel for transportation [12,13]. In the mid of the 19th century, petroleum began to substitute the coal, act as the main supply for the worldwide transportation energy resource [14,15]. Nowadays, the daily worldwide crude oil consumption is about a hundred million barrels [16] that is equal to 27 Mt of CO2 has been emitted into the atmosphere daily. From 1880, the carbon emission continually increased; until 2017 about 10 Gt of carbon have been accumulated in the atmosphere. As a result, the temperature abnormality increased to +1 oC [17]. In 12 Dec 2015, Paris, the Parties to the UNFCCC reached a landmark agreement to combat climate change and to accelerate and intensify the actions and investments needed for a sustainable low carbon future. In this agreement, the temperature abnormality of +2 oC have been chosen as a target and an alert [18]. Scientists argued that the raise of the temperature should not exceed 1.5 to 2 degree. Under this condition the climate can be maintained, and no big recession will occur. The would can still in sustainable developing path without the catastrophic disaster. However, from all the data collected and processed in an RCP model, to avoid crossing the line seems hard to be realized [11].

To predict the relation between the carbon emission and temperature, RCP scenario have been proposed. Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) is a greenhouse gas (GHG) emission projection that proposed by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) at 2014 in assessment report 5 [11]. This prediction was made by climate data and computational simulations. After huge amount of data collection and massive predictive simulation, 4 stable models have been obtained, which are RCP8.5, RCP6, RCP4.5, RCP2.6. Each prediction indicates a certain path for future human society. The number after ‘RCP’ indicates the radiative forcing value in year 2100 (2.6, 4.5, 6.0, and 8.5 W/m2, respectively). CO2 is a typical greenhouse gas as well as the water vapor and Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) which could be found in the atmosphere that absorb the energy from the solar radiation [17]. Back to the days before pre-industrial era, the greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere was much lower than now and the heat of the earth received from the solar radiation and the heat dissipate maintained at dynamic balance. From Industrial Revolution, several giga tons of the carbon dioxide have been emitted to the atmosphere that the heat adsorbing capability dramatically increased. The earth getting hotter and hotter. The raise of the temperature is a systematic problem. From the results of RCP model, the hot temperature brings local extreme high temperature and severe drought. In the coastal area the sea level rises, and tremendous land will be inhabitable. The model of RCP 8.5 depicted a catastrophic future. Without the effort to reduce the carbon emission, a severe consequence will eventually come true.

From the experience of billions year, the earth has endured innumerous super volcanic eruptions [19], asteroid impacts [20], and at least 5 times Major Ace Ages [21]. None of those catastrophic phenomena destroyed the earth. The only thing human should worry about is the civilization will be destroyed by our aggressive human activity.

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