Using the Oceans To Store CO2 Could Help Avoid Climate Catastrophe 176
The experimental process of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in oceans could help limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, explain Romany Webb and Michael B. Gerrard, both of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia Law School. Overcoming challenges presented by this treatment will need coordination with all stakeholders, including research scientists, investors, and environmental groups, they say. An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg Law: At last month's climate conference in Glasgow, U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres declared that the global goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius was still alive, but "on life support." Carbon dioxide removal (CDR) -- the process of drawing carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and storing it on land or in the oceans -- could be part of the medicine needed to bring it back to life. But, like all experimental treatments, its use presents a range of challenges. Overcoming them will require a coordinated effort by a wide range of stakeholders, from research scientists and investors to policymakers and lawyers to environmental and community groups. So far, no CDR techniques have been deployed at a large scale, and many require significantly more research before that can happen.
A new report from the National Academies of Sciences identifies over $1 billion worth of "priority research" that will be needed over the next 10 years to better assess the feasibility and impacts of key ocean CDR techniques. That includes $125 million for so-called "foundational research" on legal, policy, social science, and related issues. [...] On the legal side, there is significant uncertainty as to how different CDR techniques, particularly ocean-based techniques, will be regulated. Because the oceans form part of the global commons, ocean-based activities are subject to a large body of international law. But there is currently no comprehensive international legal framework specific to ocean CDR.
There are no U.S. federal laws dealing specifically with ocean CDR. Unless and until that changes, projects will end up being regulated under general environmental laws that were developed with other activities in mind, and so may be poorly suited to ocean CDR. We've documented some of the potential problems in two recent reports on the laws governing ocean alkalinization and seaweed cultivation for the purposes of CDR. As recognized in the National Academies report, developing a "clear and consistent legal framework for ocean CDR is essential to facilitate research and (if deemed appropriate) full-scale deployment, while also ensuring that projects are conducted in a safe and environmentally sound manner."It is vital that framework be developed with input from all stakeholders -- scientists, entrepreneurs, governments, NGOs, environmentalists, indigenous peoples, coastal communities, and other potentially impacted groups. Those same groups must continue to be engaged as projects are developed and deployed. [...] Further engagement and coordination with the full range of stakeholders are important to ensure safe and responsible CDR development and deployment. Without that, our hopes of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius may well be dead and buried.
A new report from the National Academies of Sciences identifies over $1 billion worth of "priority research" that will be needed over the next 10 years to better assess the feasibility and impacts of key ocean CDR techniques. That includes $125 million for so-called "foundational research" on legal, policy, social science, and related issues. [...] On the legal side, there is significant uncertainty as to how different CDR techniques, particularly ocean-based techniques, will be regulated. Because the oceans form part of the global commons, ocean-based activities are subject to a large body of international law. But there is currently no comprehensive international legal framework specific to ocean CDR.
There are no U.S. federal laws dealing specifically with ocean CDR. Unless and until that changes, projects will end up being regulated under general environmental laws that were developed with other activities in mind, and so may be poorly suited to ocean CDR. We've documented some of the potential problems in two recent reports on the laws governing ocean alkalinization and seaweed cultivation for the purposes of CDR. As recognized in the National Academies report, developing a "clear and consistent legal framework for ocean CDR is essential to facilitate research and (if deemed appropriate) full-scale deployment, while also ensuring that projects are conducted in a safe and environmentally sound manner."It is vital that framework be developed with input from all stakeholders -- scientists, entrepreneurs, governments, NGOs, environmentalists, indigenous peoples, coastal communities, and other potentially impacted groups. Those same groups must continue to be engaged as projects are developed and deployed. [...] Further engagement and coordination with the full range of stakeholders are important to ensure safe and responsible CDR development and deployment. Without that, our hopes of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius may well be dead and buried.
baking soda (Score:2)
Time to throw baking soda in the ocean at scale? I'm not convinced.
Re:baking soda (Score:4, Interesting)
Time to throw baking soda in the ocean at scale? I'm not convinced.
If you remove NaCl from the ocean and turn it into baking soda, then what do you do with the chlorine?
You don't need to mix the CO2 into the seawater. Deep ocean water is at 4C (39F) and 300 atm. At that temperature and pressure, CO2 is a liquid. It is much heavier than water, so there is no problem getting it down there. You just need a barrier to keep it from mixing with the seawater. Since there is no pressure differential, any non-permeable barrier should work.
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I know you didn't RTFA... they are talking about making the ocean more alkaline so that it will have more capacity to soak up CO2. In other words make the ocean more basic that and then it can take up more acid.
Re: Is there not a way to use... (Score:2)
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Nothing is gonna happen (Score:3, Insightful)
And, by then, we'll probably need geo-engineering, because of the momentum in the system. If not, I guess we can always migrate towards the poles. People might get serious about it once we have a 2000-mile-wide band of uninhabitable climate around the equator.
I'll give it a 10% chance that our species chooses to completely ignore climate change and ruins this planet. Crappy odds. I sure hope that Musk manages to push his Mars initiative through. Just as insurance against willful human stupidity.
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You're talking about chimp++ here -- should be a 90% chance.
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You're talking about chimp++ here -- should be a 90% chance.
Pretty much. Maybe there will be a brief decade of hectic activity before literally everything collapses.
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Looks like it, unfortunately. However it will be about 50...100 years to late for anything effective when that state is reached. Geoengineering takes _time_.
Forget Mars. Mars will still be much worse than the worst-case scenarios for climate change here could ever be. And Mars will not get sustainable anytime soon, if ever.
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Looks like it, unfortunately. However it will be about 50...100 years to late for anything effective when that state is reached. Geoengineering takes _time_.
This needs to be at +5 insightful.
This is exactly Geoengineering. And this document shows it better than the gobbledygook from the cited page: https://climate.law.columbia.e... [columbia.edu]
This is just plain weird. They are worried about the land based CO2 elimination aspect, taking up much acreage. Where do they think the absolutely huge amounts of alkaline minerals needed to alkalize the world's oceans will come from.
To boot, they can't use plain old limestone because the ocean waters are already saturated wi
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"Overcoming challenges presented by this treatment will need coordination with all stakeholders, including research scientists, investors, and environmental groups, they say."
That pretty much reduces the chance of anything ever happening to 0, yep.
Re: Nothing is gonna happen (Score:2)
I don't understand their usage of "stakeholders". Aren't we all stakeholders if we want to breath? (A reminder that CO2 build up in the air will cause cognitive difficulty. We need clean air to think clearly.)
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until we see effects that kill people in the millions. No, make that 10s or maybe even 100s of millions. Until then, it's drill baby drill. Too many people and too much $$$$ have been invested in denying the science.
Nope, that won't happen. That's because wind and solar power are already lower cost than coal and natural gas. We won't see "big oil" and "big gas" buy politicians to maintain their position in the market because buying politicians costs money, by definition. Greed will drive people away from fossil fuels. People in the business of fossil fuels will simply find it more profitable to invest in wind and solar power than try to buy politicians for legislation in favor of fossil fuels.
I'll give it a 10% chance that our species chooses to completely ignore climate change and ruins this planet. Crappy odds. I sure hope that Musk manages to push his Mars initiative through. Just as insurance against willful human stupidity.
I give it a 100% chanc
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I sure hope you're right, but you pointed out that sunk costs for fossil fuels means that they aren't going to go offline for decades.
Sure, but building more capacity in fossil fuel plants doesn't necessarily mean burning more fossil fuels. The difference between capacity and actual output is called capacity factor. Also, we are seeing new natural gas replace old coal. We also see old inefficient natural gas be replaced by newer more efficient natural gas. We build fossil fuel capacity to meet peak demand but we only burn fuel in those plants to make up for what is not covered by hydro, wind, solar, nuclear, etc. The largest operatin
Re: Nothing is gonna happen (Score:2)
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Re:Nothing is gonna happen (Score:5, Insightful)
Youve got a very positive outlook on this.
Why would I not have a positive outlook? If I bring up nuclear power to these banshees that scream about global warming they respond on how wind, solar, and storage is lower cost, safer, lower in CO2 emissions, and doesn't produce any radioactive waste. That sounds to me like we solved the problem of global warming. It appears I agree with these banshees that the problem is solved, there's just a disagreement on how we solved it. Makes me have to wonder why they scream so much.
I'm seeing two camps on this. There's the "all the above" people like myself, where we take any option on energy so long as it moves us closer to lower CO2 emissions and lower energy prices. That can mean using natural gas if it is replacing coal.
The other camp will claim to have an "all the above" plan but they don't actually believe in all the above. They are offering the "Meatloaf energy" plan. They will do anything for lowering CO2, but they won't do that.
We solved our energy problems. All we need to do now is get those Meatloafs to sing a different tune.
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I sure hope that Musk manages to push his Mars initiative through. Just as insurance against willful human stupidity.
thinking that we can realistically populate mars (which is half a year of travel away, with no atmosphere and freezing cold) when we can't even keep earth in minimal condition (where we already are, with plenty of air and cozy warm weather) is really gullible to the extreme. that's not insurance, that's suicidal.
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I sure hope that Musk manages to push his Mars initiative through. Just as insurance against willful human stupidity.
thinking that we can realistically populate mars (which is half a year of travel away, with no atmosphere and freezing cold) when we can't even keep earth in minimal condition (where we already are, with plenty of air and cozy warm weather) is really gullible to the extreme. that's not insurance, that's suicidal.
All of ol Muskie's sycophants seem to think that for some strange reason, Leaving earth for a place where you can't go outside without full body protection from cold or lack of oxygen or you'll die, living in a cave under dictatorial rule, eating only whatever they manage to grow - perhaps algae, but almost certainly vegan - is somehow a nirvana as compared to living on earth. That's pure escapism.
It will be subsistence living, where any loss of life support systems means you ded. The main goal will be st
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The other weird idea is that they can land somewhere random, well I'm sure they'll look from orbit, and have all the resources needed to be self-sustaining. There's something like 40 elements required for our life form and something like a minimum of 60 elements required for an advanced industrial society.
All it takes is no calcium or phosphorous, to pull 2 elements out of my ass, to make self sustaining impossible. Likewise with, pulling out of my ass again, lithium or uranium for their power needs.
Even on
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The other weird idea is that they can land somewhere random, well I'm sure they'll look from orbit, and have all the resources needed to be self-sustaining. There's something like 40 elements required for our life form and something like a minimum of 60 elements required for an advanced industrial society.
But there are plenty of Perchlorates.
To me, if Mars is shown to be lifeless, I have no qualms about terraforming it. But we have a lot of people that seem to think we're going to go there, and in Elon Musk's lifetime, we'll be terraforming it in a few years. If we want to terraform, it will take centuries, perhaps thousands of years.
First is creating a synthetic magnetosphere. That would actually be fairly simple - but we hardly hear of anyone outside NASA speak of it. Some1 Tesla magnets at Lagrange
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We *already* need geoengineering.
In fact, we've been doing geoengineering for centuries: Converting forests to arable land, building huge infrastructures, massively changing biomass distribution in mammals, and yes, changing the atmosphere.
There is nothing inherently bad about geoengineering.
In fact, I'd argue the amount of geoengineering needed to counter global warming is significant, but not impossible: Carbon emissions amount to a couple dozen cubic km of material each year. You'd need material of the
Re:Nothing is gonna happen (Score:5, Insightful)
How do you screw up a dead planet?
You can only pollute a living planet. On a dead planet, you are only rearranging the elements and compounds that exist there.
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We still havenâ(TM)t learned (how to prevent rich people from screwing everything up in the name of greed).
We solved global warming by making low CO2 energy cheaper than fossil fuel energy.
No. We solve it by sufficiently fast implementation and roll out, not just by having it exist in theory. We do that by rolling out enough of the low gCO2/kWh (2018 AR5 and SRREN put the average for nuclear and wind neck-and-neck, wind cheaper) at the lowest systems cost (a mix of wind, nuclear, hydro, tidal and peaking gas) quickly enough. See AR5 WG3 pp. 238-9.
Ocean Acidification (Score:5, Informative)
The oceans are already soaking up the CO2, and its lowering the pH, which has its own consequences.
Re:Ocean Acidification (Score:5, Insightful)
Came here to find out how they will store CO2 in the ocean without causing this, possibly the most dangerous aspect of global warming.
Re:Ocean Acidification (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe ask some scientists next...
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Came here to find out how they will store CO2 in the ocean without causing this, possibly the most dangerous aspect of global warming.
The plan is twofold. Either electrolyze ocean water, removing the Sulfuric acid produced, or dumping Calcium oxide in the water. Cant use plain Limestone because the ocean is already loaded with Calcium carbonate.
So we can all figure out the utter magnitude of H2SO4 being produced and what the heck to do with all of that. And the production of Calcium Oxide is going to take a lot of energy, a huge landscape and ecosystem altering effort. and that's a hell of an energetic and exothermic reaction putting
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Yup, adding CO2 increases the acidity which kills of the phytoplankton. The phytoplankton are responsible for the ocean removing so much atmospheric carbon - so you really do not want to be killing them off.
All of these sorts of proposals appear to be geared towards giving people reasons why we can continue to extract and burn buried carbon. "Don't worry, we can engineer a solution in the future - so keep burning oil.." All wasted time and energy which delays creating a real solution.
Whither ocean acidification? (Score:5, Interesting)
Dumping carbon dioxide into the ocean is likely to lower its pH even more than we've already done, preventing creatures which build shells using calcium carbonate from forming them. That could be even more devastating than climate change alone.
Re:Whither ocean acidification? (Score:5, Informative)
Dumping carbon dioxide into the ocean is likely to lower its pH even more than we've already done, preventing creatures which build shells using calcium carbonate from forming them. That could be even more devastating than climate change alone.
I'm new here so I still actually read the links given in the summary before commenting, I also read the summary and not just the title. In those links, and the summary, they discuss the means by which this carbon sequestration happens. They consider seaweed cultivation, drawing CO2 from the water by conversion into plant mass. They consider dumping in alkaline substances, which will react with the CO2 and form stable substances that will settle to the seafloor. They consider various means to introduce substances into the sea to promote growth of algae, another process that will soak up carbon and see it settle to the seafloor.
They are not acidifying the sea, they are lowering the acid levels so that the sea will take up more CO2. If successful the problem could be the acid levels getting too low locally.
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Also, geoengineering was always going to happen. Even private individuals have dabbled in it, and its a weapon as much as it is a tool.
The future isnt going to be about fighting global warming. The future is going to be about changing large environments in many ways for many reasons. Temperature is going to be an afterthought. Its probably a bad idea for it to be dabbled in, but it was ALWAYS going to happen. Attempted prevention of the uncountable ways its going to be done is a
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Also, geoengineering was always going to happen. Even private individuals have dabbled in it, and its a weapon as much as it is a tool.
The future isnt going to be about fighting global warming. The future is going to be about changing large environments in many ways for many reasons. Temperature is going to be an afterthought. Its probably a bad idea for it to be dabbled in, but it was ALWAYS going to happen. Attempted prevention of the uncountable ways its going to be done is a far worse idea. If you want to be ready, you need practitioners.
We have a lot of examples of inadvertently altering things. Definitely on a small scale though. In my area, at one time the iron industry required charcoal, and it's been written that you could stand on top of the local mountains and not see a tree as far as you could see.
In addition, they created dams to temporarily hold the logs until they got enough water and logs to release them and get the logs to the larger rivers.
Scoured the mountains and creeks and rivers. A lot of soil was washed away. Same ha
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That was my hope, so thank you for summarising as my immediate thought was the same as the GP.
But I'm not sure why this needs billions in research, it doesn't. We already know that restoring kelp forests, and sea grass meadows will contribute significantly to this because they absorb more CO2 than even the densest rainforests, they're incredibly efficient carbon sinks. What we need is $1billion in funding to actually start fucking doing it and legislation to support it; better protecting sea otters enable t
Re: Whither ocean acidification? (Score:2)
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I'm new here so I still actually read the links given in the summary before commenting, I also read the summary and not just the title. In those links, and the summary, they discuss the means by which this carbon sequestration happens. They consider seaweed cultivation, drawing CO2 from the water by conversion into plant mass. They consider dumping in alkaline substances, which will react with the CO2 and form stable substances that will settle to the seafloor. They consider various means to introduce substances into the sea to promote growth of algae, another process that will soak up carbon and see it settle to the seafloor.
They are not acidifying the sea, they are lowering the acid levels so that the sea will take up more CO2. If successful the problem could be the acid levels getting too low locally.
Sure - it's some elementary chemistry. But it's kind of staggering the amounts of electrolysis and/or the amount of say Calcium Oxide it will take to do this. How we will take those amounts out of the earth and the power to produce Calcium Oxide and remember - it must be done on a global scale.
This reminds me of the scientist who wanted to seed the oceans with iron filings some years back. Yeah, if we did that on a global scale, the reaction would remove CO2. But the incredible amounts needed to see th
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How we will take those amounts out of the earth and the power to produce Calcium Oxide and remember - it must be done on a global scale.
Calcium oxide exists in abundance in nature. Basalt formations contain calcium oxide and these formations can be found all over the place. We mine limestone and "cook" it down into lime because basalt is really hard on mining equipment, the hard sand in the lime wears out tools quickly. A combination of new materials and low CO2 energy to power the equipment and we can dig up calcium oxide until the end of time. We pay for this mining by people looking for lime to use in cement, agricultural lime to con
We really do need to figure out carbon capture (Score:5, Interesting)
So far, the existing technologies for removing CO2 only make sense for scrubbing it at the source, similar to how a catalytic converter works on the exhaust of your car as the exhaust is leaving the vehicle. So far, capturing CO2 "from thin air" at scale hasn't been plausible. So it's tempting to walk away from that idea.
BUT ...
Even if we eliminated ALL human production of CO2 (which isn't remotely possible), that would only cut total CO2 emissions by 4%. Cutting our emissions by half only cuts total emissions by TWO PERCENT! So that's not really a winning strategy either. Plus it does nothing about the CO and CO2 that's already been emitted, that's already in the atmosphere.
Carbon capture allows us to target ALL of the CO2. It doesn't limit to only the 4% that's produced by human activity. Like aiming at "the broad side of a barn", it's a lot easier target to hit.
By far the largest source of CO2 is in fact ocean outgassing. If we could find a way to slow the net outgassing, to put some back in the ocean, that may reduce atmospheric CO2 levels more quickly than slashing human activity would, and without the damage to human lives that we collectively call "the economy".
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Well, then this fight is pretty much over and it has been lost. The scale and speed needed for effective carbon capture is not within reach to the human race. It is a few orders of magnitude too large.
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It is a few orders of magnitude too large.
A funny thing about the rate of technological development since the dawn of man, is that it has proven to be exponential.
For fuck sakes when I was born the world was still stringing up telephone wire, while at the same time moving from human operated switching systems (youve seen that operator in the old movies who connects your call, physically plugging in wires) to electronically controlled switching systems.
The remote control for our one black and white television was a real clicker. A device that w
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Even if we eliminated ALL human production of CO2 (which isn't remotely possible), that would only cut total CO2 emissions by 4%.
If we cut our emissions by 4% we'd be fine as natural processes can remove more than 100% of natural emissions. I
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And the ocean is acidifying from this, making the ocean 25% more acidic. "But the ocean is alkaline, so No Big Deal ".. Sadly the life of the ocean is hit hard by the change in acidity, and it mucks with things hard. So dumping CO2 into the ocean is a crap solution, or preventing it's outgassing (same result)
The idea isn't to dump CO2 into the oceans. It is to somehow make the oceans more alkaline so that Seaweed grows and somehow sequesters CO2.
The whole idea seems to assume that the world's oceans are smaller than say - lake Ontario. Because their proposed methods of making the global oceans more alkaline are using something like Calcium Oxide or electrolyzing Sea water to create sulfuric acid they will remove from the seawater and do something with.
Apparently ignoring that the amounts of Calcium Oxide
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Releasing CO2 is and has been our way to get energy quickly cheaply.
Capturing it basically means reversing this process requiring an equal amount of energy.
We should satisfy our energy needs differently and stop burning stuff.
In the end we will have to, since we ourselves breathe oxygen, and i'm sure we don't want to suffocate.
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Capturing it basically means reversing this process requiring an equal amount of energy.
It may take more energy to capture it due to the chemical processes involved and/or diffuse nature of the gaa. If you can direct energy from renewables or other low-carbon energy production methods that would be in excess of demand then you can run processes to capture it, provided that they can cope with some level of stop-start. If you can encourage natural processes to scale (e.g. seaweed) you might do better. However, displacing CO2-producing processes with low-carbon alternatives wherever is possible o
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Hardly. "All the CO2" is present at about 415 parts per million. Human-produced CO2 in exhaust gasses tends to be present at 50,000 to 150,000 parts per million.
When you're seeking to capture a resource, it's universally (i.e., thermodynamically and thus inescapably) easier to target the highest concentrations of th
Re: We really do need to figure out carbon capture (Score:2)
We have.
We have a cheap, self-replicating, self-repairing, robust, mechanism for capturing CO2, which works with solar power: trees.
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Carbon capture allows us to target ALL of the CO2.
Then we will die, as Carbon Dioxide and the warming it creates is essential to life on earth as we know it. Without it, we'd be around -18 decrees C global average.
https://energyeducation.ca/enc... [energyeducation.ca]
Maybe there would be life at oceanic vents, but CO2 is a critical part of our atmosphere, essential to life as we know it.
We have seen the effects of suddenly releasing sequestered CO2 and now methane into the atmosphere. Will efforts to suddenly remove it create a problem in the other direction?
The pro
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Don't try to talk sense!
He's not, as he's ignoring natural processes that already remove CO2 from the atmosphere.
Re:We really do need to figure out carbon capture (Score:5, Informative)
He's likely getting it from the IPCC's 4th report, chapter 7, which is commonly cited online for reporting that 3.6% of CO2 emissions each year are attributable to human sources. Specifically, 438 Gt from natural vegetation and land, 332 Gt from the ocean, and 29 Gt from humans. So a total of 799 Gt, with 29 Gt from human sources, 29/799 = 3.6%. I'm sure the IPCCs numbers have fluctuated over time, but not by all that much as to make 4% an unreasonable number.
What's your source for the idea that mankind is the biggest CO2 producer on the planet? It sounds like you have a very distorted view of where atmospheric CO2 comes from.
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It sounds like you and yours are disingenuously substituting "gross" for "net." That IPCC report [archive.ipcc.ch] shows that vegetation consumes more CO2 than it produces per year (120 GtC/yr versus 119.6 Gt/yr) while people decidedly do not (3.2 GtC/yr versus 6.4 GtC/yr).
So in terms of net production, 4% is an entirely unreasonable number.
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It sounds like the point of the original poster which the person I was responding to was inaccurately contradicting also flew over your head, or else you didn't even bother to read the full discussion.
I'll recap it for you. Mankind is only the source for 4% of annual CO2 emissions, so even cutting that completely means you can at most reduce 4% of the total CO2 emitted in a year.
In contrast, a method to sequester CO2 or increase the natural update of CO2 by the ocean or vegetation can remove more than that
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Nope. I responded to that as well.
Since we cannot even remove the 4% of the gross production of CO2 that we are responsible for,
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Ah, I see now why you don't appear to be able to think, only regurgitate based on pattern-matching. If only you had graduate degrees in reading comprehension and in logic...
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Yes, I understand the theory, but that's irrelevant to the point of the original poster [slashdot.org] who he was disagreeing with.
The point was that even reducing 100% of human-responsible CO2 emissions can at most affect 4% of the annual total, but instead sequestering carbon can affect an even higher percentage of that.
To use your bath analogy, you're talking about turning the tap down a little, he's talking about putting a second controllable drain in, which can be much larger than the tap is, and thus much more effec
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Yes, I understand the theory, but that's irrelevant to the point of the original poster [slashdot.org] who he was disagreeing with.
The point was that even reducing 100% of human-responsible CO2 emissions can at most affect 4% of the annual total, but instead sequestering carbon can affect an even higher percentage of that.
To use your bath analogy, you're talking about turning the tap down a little, he's talking about putting a second controllable drain in, which can be much larger than the tap is, and thus much more effective at managing the total water level.
In theory, yes, you could sequester more than the 4% that humans produce, and we should probably look at doing that to bring the total concentration down from 415ppm. If we cut production it would make that much easier, and if we cut production down to zero, then natural processes would also reduce the total concentration from 415ppm. I think we were talking a bit at cross purposes, but hopefully can find some common ground. It's just that often I see people say "humans only produce 4% so it's not us that's
Lawyers are in this now? We are doomed! (Score:3)
Also, what is it with the fantasy that 1.5C is still reachable? 1.5C is if we do everything possible yesterday (we will not) and if some pretty much assured accelerators turn out to be false. Without that we have 2.5C already "locked in" and that is if we do everything possible now.
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Then we had worldwide destruction from ozone. Then it was a new ice age.
You have the ordering of those back to front, and the ice age was an arithmetic error by two scientists and some sloppy journalism for just one year.
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I don't care how much money anyone has, if they take global warming seriously then they are not going to buy beachfront property.
If Obama likes the beach he can afford to buy a beach property and enjoy it when it is nice and before it is under water and 'waste' the money as he can afford a lavish lifestyle without needing to worry about it. He can easily afford to not be in that property if there is a storm, which unfortunately many who live on coasts cannot. He can afford to get the electrics modified to make the chance of it burning down minimal. If it blows over, he can buy another one. He's not at any particular risk, can afford
Re: Lawyers are in this now? We are doomed! (Score:2)
Werther and climate are not the same.
It's called a weather forecast, but a climate change.
Re: Lawyers are in this now? We are doomed! (Score:2)
Re: Lawyers are in this now? We are doomed! (Score:2)
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I'm old and not senile but a leader in my technical industry. Better than being young, stupid and repeat what others say. By 2030, you will own nothing and be happy. We will own everything and be happier
For a technical leader, you make some assumptions, donchya?
But first thing you need to do is to explain how you take one data point - and make no mistake - you asserted:
Our local weather forecasters rarely are accurate over 12 hours.
First off what is the numerical value of rarely? In our area, they predict what time the weather events are going to start, and it' is pretty accurate around 90 percent of the time. It is more difficult to predict the exact temperature in any given place, because as an
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Goes well with the fantasy that all communities will be fine.
Where in reality, I'd look at Fargo as a mini-example of economics. Fargo isn't really a global warming issue (yet, at least), but has the problem of being built o
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There are plenty of towns and cities in Siberia that have harsh problems due to global warming as the perma frost they are build on is melting.
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Evidence of these places in Siberia?
https://www.dw.com/en/siberia-... [dw.com]
https://www.weforum.org/agenda... [weforum.org]
The Siberian holes might be related. The jury is out. https://www.nbcnews.com/scienc... [nbcnews.com]
https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com] Yakutia, has warmed by more than 3 degrees Celsius since preindustrial times.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/r... [sciencedaily.com]
Disclaimer - these sources are not Fox News Infowars, or One America Network.
Re: (Score:2)
Also, what is it with the fantasy that 1.5C is still reachable? 1.5C is if we do everything possible yesterday (we will not) and if some pretty much assured accelerators turn out to be false. Without that we have 2.5C already "locked in" and that is if we do everything possible now.
Well, everything else on the proposal is bullshit, so why wouldn't their goal be just that.
This whole thing seems to use the same mentality that things like Waterseer or Theranos use to get investors. Sounds good, but the applied physics aren't there.
Bad feedback loops (Score:2)
But we will keep extracting fossil carbon and not touching a penny of the companies that make trillions with that
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Fifty times as much in the ocean than air (Score:2)
The ocean already has fifty times as much CO2 as the air does. Reducing the CO2 content of the atmosphere by 5% would only increase the ocean concentration by 0.1%.
Not that it's ideal, but 0.1% is much better than 5%.
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Send it to Mars (Score:4, Funny)
It needs the CO2 more than we do.
pH (Score:2)
The problem with this is that is changes the pH of the ocean, making it uninhabitable for most of the existing creatures.
Fossil fool companies are always looking for an excuse to burn more. This fits their agenda.
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No, it doesn't change the pH. The process of sequestering the CO2 is in the summary. They intend to promote plant growth so the carbon is turned into plant matter
Would this then need to be dumped into the deep ocean where there is little mixing with the upper ocean to avoid it decaying and the CO2 being released again, either into the ocean (increasing pH) or exchanging back with the atmosphere in the upper layers? Or is it going to be Soylent Seaweed/cow food? I presume they've checked this.
and/or dump substances into the sea that will react with the CO2 dissolved in the water and create stable compounds that will settle to the seafloor.
Is there enough of this that can be mined such that it is CO2 negative? I presume they've checked that too.
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No, it doesn't change the pH. The process of sequestering the CO2 is in the summary. They intend to promote plant growth so the carbon is turned into plant matter
Would this then need to be dumped into the deep ocean where there is little mixing with the upper ocean to avoid it decaying and the CO2 being released again, either into the ocean (increasing pH) or exchanging back with the atmosphere in the upper layers? Or is it going to be Soylent Seaweed/cow food? I presume they've checked this.
It sounds like they are trying to somehow emulate the geologic process of sequestration, where the plant matter somehow gets buried.
Otherwise, despite the belief of many, the whole process would be carbon neutral.
There is a lake near me that has a lot of lotus lilies. Every year, the old growth dies off and sinks to the bottom. It decomposes, and releases methane. I go canoeing there at times, and if your paddle touches the bottom, a lot of methane bubbles are released. Otherwise it's just some number
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It sounds like they are trying to somehow emulate the geologic process of sequestration, where the plant matter somehow gets buried.
That would be required. I should read more on how it might be achieved. Either that or we use it to stop cows producing methane and replace steak with kelp. The latter would not be popular.
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It sounds like they are trying to somehow emulate the geologic process of sequestration, where the plant matter somehow gets buried.
That would be required. I should read more on how it might be achieved. Either that or we use it to stop cows producing methane and replace steak with kelp. The latter would not be popular.
Talk about serendipity. There was an article here a few days back about adding a bit of kelp to cows diets to stop their evil methane emitting ways.
Pickled kelp is big in Alaska http://www.montereybayseaweeds... [montereybayseaweeds.com] Don't think I'd want to sub it for a hamburger though.
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Talk about serendipity. There was an article here a few days back about adding a bit of kelp to cows diets to stop their evil methane emitting ways.
It's what I was alluding to!
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Talk about serendipity. There was an article here a few days back about adding a bit of kelp to cows diets to stop their evil methane emitting ways.
It's what I was alluding to!
Talk about me needing a big Whoosh! Can I get a whoosh?
Re: Capitalism isn't the problem (Re:pH) (Score:2)
Dumping stuff in the ocean. Screws up the ocean.
Capitalism does what's profitable, not what's best for people.
People demand energy. Fossil fuel provides energy but screws up the environment. Solar and wind are cheaper.
Fossils receive massive subsidies. Fossil companies work to prevent competition from cheaper solar and wind.
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Dumping stuff in the ocean. Screws up the ocean.
Have you ever read the disclaimer on medical prescriptions? They will point out that every medicine will have side effects but the physician has measured the detrimental side effects against the beneficial primary effect before prescribing the medication. This is often followed by instructions that if you believe the side effects outweigh the benefits then stop taking it. Thee people are proposing these solutions because they believe the benefits outweigh and detrimental side effects. Also, we are alrea
great idea then freeze it in ice! (Score:2)
Rebranding... (Score:3)
One way or another, this must happen (Score:2)
There will be a technological solution, because that's the only way this will be solved.
Whether it will be something like this, or something else, I don't know, but there will have to be be a technological solution. It will not be solved by ordering all us proles to live stone age while our betters jet around to climate conferences.
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There will be a technological solution, because that's the only way this will be solved.
Not only must the solution be technological it must also be profitable.
We can get people to donate to carbon sequestration efforts but that only subsidizes fossil fuel burning. Subsidies to wind and solar end up as a fungible fund that utilities use to buy more natural gas. Carbon taxes used to pay for low carbon energy just shifts the prices on fossil fuel energy and low carbon energy until the two meet in the middle somewhere.
If we are to lower CO2 emissions then we need to make the lower CO2 options co
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Energy storage only helps lower CO2 emissions when a reliable high CO2 emitter like coal is replaced with a reliable low CO2 emitter like nuclear.
Nuclear nutter logic. Energy storage doesn't care if the energy source is intermittent or not. That's the point. You are storing the intermittent power until it is needed.
You're just trying to pimp for nuclear when it's more expensive than solar and wind, and not required.
Storage can be expensive, so it needs to be factored in as you increase the amount of renewables being used. The old rubric was that significant storage would be needed at 60% but that is probably too low given more recent experience. It can also be gas turbine peaking if you can store the gas and capture CO2 at source and/or scrub it back out of the atmosphere rather than batteries. Having a well-connected grid on a wide scale also helps. And where I would agree with McMann is that some nuclear will also
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There will be a technological solution, because that's the only way this will be solved.
Whether it will be something like this, or something else, I don't know, but there will have to be be a technological solution. It will not be solved by ordering all us proles to live stone age while our betters jet around to climate conferences.
Oh, I have bad news.
The only solution that will even approximate working is that we put the skids on de-sequestering CO2, then accept the roller coaster ride that we have started on, play out.
Playing with sequestering Carbon is tinkering with a global ecosystem on a huge scale. And the silliness that people have, believing that planting trees, or in this case, altering the oceans of an entire world to plant seaweed - this is carbon neutral at it's very best, an exercise not unlike you and I locking our
Freeze it in Antartica, dump the CO2 clathrate (Score:2)
First you can FREEZE the CO2 out of the atmosphere in Antarctica relatively cheaply because at -70C the Antarctic winter is close(r) to the freezing point of CO2 (-80C)*. As was outlined in a proposal by Dr. Agee (Chairman of the Climate Change dept. at Purdue University), the refrigeration plants can be put at locations on the coast due to the cold fast winds coming from the valleys that originate in the interior high desert. In addition to being easier for construction due to ocean access, the winds wil
how about oxygen? (Score:2)
I just wonder how this plan "of saving Earth" would influence oxygen production of our planet, as it is estimated that 50-80% of it is produced by ocean dwelling plankton.
https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/... [noaa.gov]
Huh? (Score:2)
CO2 + abiotic processes (Score:2)
This is how hydrocarbons are made. Forget the rotting vegetable matter theory. Abiotic is where it's at.
CO2 is needed in the water to get the process working.
Annnd fear-mongering for the win! (Score:2)
With fear the most questionable ideas somehow become worthy for consideration. THAT is the problem with a fear-based approach to climate change.
Two questions:
a) what is the impact of concentrating and storing all the CO2 in the ocean
b) in a closed system like our planet, how long do you think something can be 'stored' away from everything else?
We are a species wasteful and inefficient in its use and consumption of resources. That has to change especially since we are a species that is continuing to grow
Agree WTFA, let's defer problem to future gens. (Score:2)
Honestly, in a closed system like the planet how long do you think you can just stuff away CO2 (or anything) before you run out of room?
Try this: From now on sweep the floor of your home then take all the dust and dirt ... and put it in a suitcase or closet or your basement. It may take a while but like it or not you _will_ run out of storage space and you or someone in your house _will_ have to deal with the problem.
Note: if you are happy with 'storing' then push hard for nuclear power because that will
Ho hum (Score:2)
There's no free lunch. But, there's lots of free government money with which to buy lunch.
Race condition (Score:2)
Since warmer water can store less CO2, you need to get ahead of that curve pretty quickly. Assuming, of course, that you want acid oceans for some reason.