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There are actually proposals to do something like that, however it's more likely to be wood, not corn. But this has all kinds of potential issues. The likely b

by hannob 10y ago

There are actually proposals to do something like that, however it's more likely to be wood, not corn. But this has all kinds of potential issues. The likely biggest one is that whatever you want to bury needs to be grown somewhere. It needs space where things can grow, that means space and soil that can't be used otherwise to grow food. If you cut down existing trees you're likely causing more emissions than you bury. If you create even stronger competition around fertile land you also create more carbon emissions through indirect landuse changes. So yes, this is a potential option, but it needs to be carefully weighted against potential downsides.

niels_olson 10y ago
Fresh Kills landfill could hold about 3 gigatons of biochar at 1.5 g/cm3, assuming an average depth is 100 m. So we need 300 of those. There are some deep canyons in the Rockies where there are very high bridges and little meaningful waterway below. I'll bet you could fit a lot more than 1 Fresh Kills in some of them. Coal trains run those tracks. American coal cars empty from the bottom. When the coal trains are empty in Wisconsin, Chicago, etc, they have to go back to the mines anyway. They can dump the biochar in a ravine en route. just need to remove a few ties and install the coal emptier. Wood or coal, the corn trains and timber trains deliver to similar places. Build biomass energy facilities in those rail transportation hubs. Omaha, Kansas City, Fargo, the Twin Cities. Of course it would make more sense to just leave the coal in the ground. But humans don't do well with static equilibrium. And you can add it to the food price: this hamburger was made from stover-fed beef. And twice the animal's feedstock in biomass was burned in biomass plants, and the biochar was sequestered. Omaha Steaks could sell 2x, 3x, 4x, and 10x beef. It'll raise the price of beef.

by hannob 10y ago

niels_olson 10y ago

Fresh Kills landfill could hold about 3 gigatons of biochar at 1.5 g/cm3, assuming an average depth is 100 m. So we need 300 of those. There are some deep canyons in the Rockies where there are very high bridges and little meaningful waterway below. I'll bet you could fit a lot more than 1 Fresh Kills in some of them. Coal trains run those tracks. American coal cars empty from the bottom. When the coal trains are empty in Wisconsin, Chicago, etc, they have to go back to the mines anyway. They can dump the biochar in a ravine en route. just need to remove a few ties and install the coal emptier. Wood or coal, the corn trains and timber trains deliver to similar places. Build biomass energy facilities in those rail transportation hubs. Omaha, Kansas City, Fargo, the Twin Cities. Of course it would make more sense to just leave the coal in the ground. But humans don't do well with static equilibrium. And you can add it to the food price: this hamburger was made from stover-fed beef. And twice the animal's feedstock in biomass was burned in biomass plants, and the biochar was sequestered. Omaha Steaks could sell 2x, 3x, 4x, and 10x beef. It'll raise the price of beef.