Talk:Heather Willauer

Notability? (recommendation for deletion)
As much as I think her research is fantastic, I have to question the notability of this page? The references are all academic publications. Frankly the whole page reads like a resume. There are a lot of people doing really cool research, but they usually don't meet the notability of having a wiki page of their own. A quick wiki search indicated no results from mainstream sources, just naval/wiki/academic sources, and not many of those either. I hate to do it, but I think I have to recommend that this page be deleted for not being notable enough. Perhaps a small amount of this content could be relocated to a page about the topic at hand?12.11.127.253 (talk) 16:05, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

I suggest that it would be better that it be on the topic of proposals to make fuel from seawater, rather than on Heather Willauer. I would note that I have seen information about this topic before on the Internet, so it might bear further exposition. The biggest question I have had on this topic, in response to the allegation that the process might cost between $3 and $6 per gallon, is whether the cost of the required nuclear reactor has been factored in somehow.Terry Thorgaard (talk) 16:52, 23 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Delete at once. Agree to move portions to "proposals to make fuel ...". Cheers.--Connection (talk) 18:49, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

Recovered references
After a profound rewriting of the page to avoid a possible misunderstand on the expression "at sea", the following references could have been lost in the text. I recovered them and list them hereafter: — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shinkolobwe (talk • contribs)


 * I restored the 2010 reference "Synfuel from Seawater", because it supported the idea that past studies concluded an impractical nature of the concept. The Palmer piece from gizmag.com was a good pop-science article that provided more accessibility for the lay reader, so it's too bad that you removed it. The other sources are still in the article. Binksternet (talk) 20:00, 15 July 2021 (UTC)

More recent references
Many references are quite ancient (2010 – 2014) and often they are no longer available (dead links), or from general media with a poor description of the process, or a presentation bias on its potential outcome. Shinkolobwe (talk) 09:37, 17 July 2021 (UTC)

I found several more recent references from scientific and technical papers about synthetic fuel production in a marine environment and sustainable aviation. They are listed hereafter:









Naturally, they are more related to the topic of synthetic fuel produced from sustainable sources of energy in a marine environment and than to the biography. Shinkolobwe (talk) 09:37, 17 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Certainly one or more of these could be used to update the figures expressed by earlier sources.
 * Addressing the main thrust of your concerns expressed on your talk page, what do you think would be a good title for a larger article about jet fuel from seawater, focusing on the technology rather than any one person? Some folks at the top of this talk page suggested something like that back in 2014. We already have Synthetic fuel which says nothing about seawater. We have Electrolysis of water which doesn't focus on carbon. Much closer to the mark is High-temperature electrolysis and Solid oxide electrolyzer cell. I think it would be beneficial to the reader to summarize the various efforts of making hydrocarbon fuel from seawater, putting it all into a new article. Perhaps the notional article could be called Fuel from seawater or Seawater-to-fuel synthesis or Catalyzing fuel from seawater or Converting seawater to fuel. What do you think, ? Binksternet (talk) 17:40, 17 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Another relevant Wikipedia topic is Fischer–Tropsch process. This 2009 piece connected the Fischer–Tropsch process to the fuel-from-seawater efforts. That article mentioned Robert Dorner and Willauer of the US Navy, and Canadian chemist Philip Jessop.
 * Regarding catalysts, we could use something about recent developments in ferrous zeolite catalysts. We have the Catalysis article which briefly mentions iron catalysts, and the Zeolite article focusing on silicon, but not a summary of new processes. Maybe a new article about Ferrous catalysts or Iron zeolite catalysis or similar. Binksternet (talk) 20:50, 17 July 2021 (UTC)

Discussion on the topic (continued here)
Hello. Thank you for your suggestion. Due to recent unexpected circumstances (independent of WP, in the daily life), I have presently very few time to contribute to Wikipedia. I think that what is needed is a kind of « hat page » (global page) on the topic with links pointing, when needed, to existing pages for the technical details already well described in Wikipedia (water electrolysis, electrodialysis, ion-selective membranes, Fischer–Tropsch process, catalysts…). As many information are already available on Wikipedia, I think it is not necessary, nor advised, to create supplementary detailed pages. In case of need, a dedicated section could simply be added to some of these pages.

I think the concise title of the page should address/summarize the main preoccupations reflected by the title of the two most recent references I recently added to this talk page, e.g.:

"Renewable recycling and synthetic fuel production in a marine environment" and to "Sustainable Aviation".

So, it could inspire a title like:

"Sustainable synthetic jet fuel produced in a marine environment" (but it is too long for a title, just a piece of sentence for the lead section introducing the topic and the contribution to the Naval Laboratory to this research).

"Jet fuel synthesized from seawater resources"

"Renewable synthetic jet fuel"

The content of the page should address in an objective and critical manner the main merits and limitations of the technique while avoiding to unduly promoting the topic as it probably occurred after a buzz in the general media before the page was created in 2014. Any sensationalism, or false hope, should be avoided because it would not serve the topic, at the contrary. It would also be better to clearly separate this topic from the bibliography stub of one of the authors working on some very detailed technical aspects of this topic.

An important aspect not to forget from sight is that seawater is only the source for H2 and, the two raw materials on which the Fischer–Tropsch process is based. Their production requires a considerable quantity of energy (250 MW/100,000 gallon kerosene). Even all the electricity produced on board of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers (200 – 250 MW maximum) is just sufficient to reach the goal claimed in the media in 2013 – 2014 at the moment of the buzz, and then the ship would be totally deprived of electricity for its normal domestic uses or for its propulsion, so it would be highly vulnerable on the battle field. The nuclear-powered aircraft carriers of the US Navy will only be able to produce a modest fraction of what was announced at that time. It is perhaps better than nothing, and it could make the difference in naval operations, but it is certainly not a miraculous solution.

The real future of such a technique is to make possible to store under a highly chemically concentrated form of hydrocarbon the energy produced by renewable sources of energy, including also ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) on-shore. OTEC of 200 – 250 MW is also not feasible at sea on board of very large ships: it is much too heavy, and as it requires many huge pipes for pumping at 1 000 m depth, and at high flow rate, the large amounts of cold water needed by OTEC, the ships would also be immobilized by the many tubings acting as immense floating anchors.

Voilà for my present suggestions on the topic, and sorry for not having had sufficient time to continue my answer to your message made on my talk page. I will also close now the discussion you have initiated there to continue it here. Best regards, Shinkolobwe (talk) 14:34, 20 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your detailed response. I will give it some thought before making any new steps. Binksternet (talk) 14:43, 20 July 2021 (UTC)