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Neat! Storing carbon stably is huge. We have much easier ways to get to 10,000 year storage (turning fast-growing biomass like miscanthus or other giant grasses
by SquirrelOnFire 10y ago
Neat! Storing carbon stably is huge. We have much easier ways to get to 10,000 year storage (turning fast-growing biomass like miscanthus or other giant grasses into charcoal and throwing it in an old mine), but i haven't heard of other super-long-term storage options.
- aeorgnoieang 10y agoLink(s)? And why is 10,000 year storage not good enough for us to already be doing it?
- hugh4 10y agoIndeed. Either the people 10,000 years from now will be smart enough to figure out something better, or they'll be hunter-gatherers who won't be too deterred by a little sea level rise on the very edge of their territory.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- SquirrelOnFire 10y agoApparently I mentally added an order of magnitude - best link I could find says 1,000 year storage http://www.carbolea.ul.ie/files/Biochar%20Swift%20Hayes%20Chemrawn.pdf http://www.carbolea.ul.ie/files/Biochar%20Swift%20Hayes%20Ch... and biochar.org
- aeorgnoieang 10y agoThanks for the link!
- aeorgnoieang 10y agoBut even 1,000 years is a long time. I'm really curious what economists, or business-people, think about biochar. Not only is it apparently inexpensive but it also improves plant yields! That seems too suspiciously like a $100 bill lying on the sidewalk. Why has no one picked it up yet? The following paper doesn't explicitly state that this is the case, but it certainly seems like biochar is not as relatively effective a fertilizer, or fuel source, as alternatives and that therefore it's relative advantage when compared to its alternatives or substitutes lies in its ability to sequester carbon: - http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40095-014-0106-4 http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40095-014-0106-4 So I guess it's really a $0 bill until the price of carbon rises (for whatever reason).