Half Order reactions and Scale determine economics:
1. The order of a reaction, like the hydroformylation of a double bond with a Rhodium triphenyl phosphine catalyst is half order, meaning that reaction rate is proportional to the square root of the catalyst concentration.
2. The investment in the reactor containing the catalyst/reaction is proportional to the cube root of the volume of the reactor. Annual costs for that reactor are proportional to it’s investment.
3. The price of Rh is relatively high ($2000/oz. in July, 2011) and if the proposed concentration in the reactor is 400 ppm, then for each carbonyl group added (H2=C=O or 30 lbs) the cost per pound of added product weight for once through use of Rh would be 2000*400*10^-6*14/30= 37.3 cents per lb.
4. An acceptable cost per pound of added product weight might be 5.0 cents per lb for catalyst cost, or nearly 10 fold lower than proposed. Rh recovery for recycle would normally be proposed.
5. Because of the reaction order and scale effect on reactor cost a preferred alternative would be to drop the Rh concentration by 100 fold while increasing the reactor volume by 10 fold.
6. Assuming a reactor investment of $1,000,000 for the 400 ppm case for 30*10^6 lbs of carbonyl with annual costs for maintainence, depreciation, taxes , insurance and other of $200,000/yr. the annual reactor cost would be 200,000*100/30,000,000=0.667 cents/lb of carbonyl. The larger reactor case would be 1.44 cents/lb of carbonyl cost.
Summary:
Case 400ppm 4ppm
Catalyst cost $/lb carbonyl 0.37 0.037
Reactor cost $/lb carbonyl 0.0067 0.0014
Sub total 0.377 0.0384

Conclusion:
The effect of scale and order combine to make an otherwise uneconomic proposal economic.

Agriculture, is primarily limited by area from the capture of the suns energy falling on earth.

While the industrial and agriculture revolutions have increased the number of dimensions being used, agriculture to date has remained limited to two dimensions and is therefore areal (n=2) not volumetric (n=3).

This limitation can be overcome by providing agro-lighting of the fields. They could/can become volumetric vice area limited. What is needed is a source for that electricity that is essentially unlimited.

One essentially unlimited source of electricity is to use continental drift as that source. As the continents move apart at a given fault line a cable across that fault can be loaded with weights and when the continents move apart the lifted weights can have their energy recovered. An accumulation of the energy of continental drift of the continents over millions of years exists in the mountains that it has built and some have been ground to dust (sand) by the winds powered by the sun and blown out to sea (e.g. off shore of the west Sahara desert of Africa). At such a place the gradient (of about 3%) down to the subduction trench can supply a head of >10,000 ft hydraulic head for a dredge supplied, reasonable length, pipeline driving a power station. All continents have such subduction trenches and gradients to them, arising from wind or water born deposits of ground up mountains, ergo the world power needs can be supplied by such.

Copyright, Donald I. Garnett, 7/11/2011, Corpus Christi, Texas.
Copyright, Donald I. Garnett, 12/6/2011, Corpus Christi, Texas.