3 ms·

I might be mistaken about this, but it puzzles me when people confidently state that people should NOT approach the problem from this angle. I feel like there

I might be mistaken about this, but it puzzles me when people confidently state that people should NOT approach the problem from this angle. I feel like there is a great deal of uncertainty in this problem space and any genuine attempt to solve should be welcome.

tozeur 8y ago
Exactly, it’s called experimentation! The above comment is equivalent to someone telling Bosch to quit because that ammonia capture process too expensive...
- gus_massa 8y ago
  The difference is that ammonia is expensive, you can sell the ammonia (or something produced with ammonia) to make fertilizers or explosives or something. There is a market for ammonia. When you capture CO2, what you can make? Some liquid like oil or gas that can be burn. Some solid like coal that can be burn. Some rock like limestone or marble that is more expensive than the natural one. You can't sell the products. A big chunk of the man made CO2 is in power plants. It's not a good idea to burn oil to produce energy and CO2, and then use a bigger amount of energy to transform the CO2 into something that is easy to store like oil. Perhaps you can use less energy to transform the CO2 into something like coal instead of oil, but in this case it would more efficient to make a new type of power plant that transform oil into a coal like product. (Essentially burn the Hydrogen in the oil and keep the Carbons alone. I'm not sure if this is thermodynamically posible, but IIRC the C-H bound has more energy that the C-C bound. And even if this is possible, there are the technological problems.)
  - aurelwu 8y ago
    CO2 has some commercial uses too (greenhouses, chemical industry), so they can actually sell some of it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide#Agricultural_and_biological_applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide#Agricultural_an... Carbon Capture - like every single other measure - won't save the climate alone but it can be a useful element in those situations where there is so much solar/wind in the grid that you need some extra consumers to not waste it. Research in that area definitely is useful, in the end it will come down to the actual prices they can achieve in reality.
  - ComputerGuru 8y ago
    The answer is to fine CO2 emissions to the point where carbon capture makes a killing.
RGamma 8y ago
Direct air capture is already _theoretically_ inefficient due to dilution effects of climate gasses. Just imagine all the natural ressources that will be embodied in just these direct-air-capture machines! It is important that we think about lowering emissions first and foremost. Thinking "ah well, let's continue as usual, we'll fix it sometime later with <insert unproven technology>" is hella dangerous and most likely won't work: We're fucking with a planetary climate system powered by the sun after all. The forces and scales at work there easily escape one's imagination...

tozeur 8y ago

Exactly, it’s called experimentation! The above comment is equivalent to someone telling Bosch to quit because that ammonia capture process too expensive...

gus_massa 8y ago
The difference is that ammonia is expensive, you can sell the ammonia (or something produced with ammonia) to make fertilizers or explosives or something. There is a market for ammonia. When you capture CO2, what you can make? Some liquid like oil or gas that can be burn. Some solid like coal that can be burn. Some rock like limestone or marble that is more expensive than the natural one. You can't sell the products. A big chunk of the man made CO2 is in power plants. It's not a good idea to burn oil to produce energy and CO2, and then use a bigger amount of energy to transform the CO2 into something that is easy to store like oil. Perhaps you can use less energy to transform the CO2 into something like coal instead of oil, but in this case it would more efficient to make a new type of power plant that transform oil into a coal like product. (Essentially burn the Hydrogen in the oil and keep the Carbons alone. I'm not sure if this is thermodynamically posible, but IIRC the C-H bound has more energy that the C-C bound. And even if this is possible, there are the technological problems.)
- aurelwu 8y ago
  CO2 has some commercial uses too (greenhouses, chemical industry), so they can actually sell some of it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide#Agricultural_and_biological_applications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide#Agricultural_an... Carbon Capture - like every single other measure - won't save the climate alone but it can be a useful element in those situations where there is so much solar/wind in the grid that you need some extra consumers to not waste it. Research in that area definitely is useful, in the end it will come down to the actual prices they can achieve in reality.
- ComputerGuru 8y ago
  The answer is to fine CO2 emissions to the point where carbon capture makes a killing.

RGamma 8y ago

Direct air capture is already _theoretically_ inefficient due to dilution effects of climate gasses. Just imagine all the natural ressources that will be embodied in just these direct-air-capture machines! It is important that we think about lowering emissions first and foremost. Thinking "ah well, let's continue as usual, we'll fix it sometime later with <insert unproven technology>" is hella dangerous and most likely won't work: We're fucking with a planetary climate system powered by the sun after all. The forces and scales at work there easily escape one's imagination...