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Permanently* *Until we act to start removing CO2 from the atmosphere through various carbon capture methods
by soreal 10y ago
Permanently*
*Until we act to start removing CO2 from the atmosphere through various carbon capture methods
- toomuchtodo 10y agoI don't see anyone doing this currently on a large enough scale, but I'm hopeful that the crashing costs of renewables, which will push the price of electricity down, will be a catalyst for implementing energy-intensive carbon capture and sequestration methods (currently being experimented with in Iceland).
- phire 10y agoIt could be a good way of dumping extra load in a renewable national grid. Spec the grid so that in low supply situations (low wind, low sun) there is enough power to cover actual demand 90% of the time. Then whenever there is extra power, (windy and/or sunny days) you redirect that extra power into carbon capture/sequestration.
- jaggederest 10y agoI wish for something like a closed loop cycle: Solar energy into electrolysis to fuel a sabatier process and feed the resulting methane into a syngas-to-gasoline process should be the standard for fuel production in the future. It's energetically expensive, but we'll never run out of water and carbon dioxide.
- cache-monet 10y agoNot exactly a closed loop - about 30-50% of the carbon dioxide we release is absorbed into the ocean[1]. So this process might actually decrease atmospheric CO2 levels, but ocean acidification will continue to increase. [1] http://www.gdrc.org/oceans/fsheet-02.html http://www.gdrc.org/oceans/fsheet-02.html
- jaggederest 10y agoCarbonic acid in the ocean is in equilibrium with the atmosphere, so if you knock down the ppm in the atmosphere it'll eventually affect the oceans.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- jonknee 10y agoThe third sentence: > That all but ensures that 2016 will be the year that carbon dioxide officially passed the symbolic 400 ppm mark, never to return below it in our lifetimes, according to scientists. So permanently as in our lifetime which is really the only type of permanence that matters.
- maerF0x0 10y agoand so people suddenly lose interest, those projects wont have much effect until after i'm dead and gone. If we can vastly expand the lifespan of an individual, suddenly they have a vested interest in the next 100, 1000, or whatever years. Suddenly it will make sense to spend a lot today to avoid pain later.
- danbruc 10y agoIf I didn't make a mistake, we are looking at removing two trillion metric tons of carbon dioxide per ppm. That is probably not a small feat. EDIT: Of course I made a mistake, it is probably more like three trillion metric tons, I mixed up fractions of volume and mass.
- jonknee 10y agoDon't forget that you'd have to do that in an entirely carbon free way and cease all current carbon emissions. That's not happening in our lifetimes.
- snewk 10y agoI would use caution throwing around ultimatums. I'm sure pocket-sized digital supercomputers or a global near-instant communications network didn't seem likely within the lifetime of people born in the Great Depression, but here we are. These exponential advances in technology are difficult to predict with human brains. I try to stay cautiously optimistic.
- honkhonkpants 10y agoToday's computers were perfectly obvious to Gordon Moore in his 1965 paper. By contrast nobody today is writing papers about the inevitable expansion of carbon-free energy production.
- johngalt 10y agoVarious forms of next generation nuclear would meet that requirement right? People are certainly writing papers on building better nuclear power plants. Doesn't even have to be something exotic like fusion.
- honkhonkpants 10y agoIf there is some kind of nuclear power that is millions of times cheaper per unit output than it was in 1965, I am unaware of it.
- oxide 10y agois carbon capture actually viable? a completely carbon-free capturing method sounds like perpetual motion or free energy.
- seanalltogether 10y agoLike trees?
- oxide 10y agotrees sound plenty viable. maybe it should be called tree planting instead.
- crististm 10y agoI don't know why this is not on the agenda. People are instead wasting money on crazy stuff like compressing CO2 into projectile like cans and dumping them into the ocean. Or my favourite, stopping the sheep from NZ from farting!!
- labster 10y agoThe terrestrial biosphere makes a terrible place to store carbon, as you really can't store that much of it, and eventually it has a tendency to burn and release it all back. If you wanted to grow a bunch of forests/crops, and then bury them and grow new stuff I guess that might work. But not as well as pumping new CO₂ underground or into the deep ocean (below the carbon compensation depth, where it will dissolve existing carbonates and buffer the ocean). Also forests make the Earth's surface darker, thus decreasing albedo and potentially increasing global warming.
- yongjik 10y agoThere's a very good chance that all this CO2 will remain in the atmosphere for longer than your permanent backups, permanent government/business records, and even some permanently owned land... That's permanent enough for me.
- duncan_bayne 10y ago> and even some permanently owned land ... especially coastal properties ;)