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Hi Rob. Why bother trying to extract CO2 out of "thin air" when there are far more concentrated sources available, for example exhaust of existing power plants

• rmcginnis 7y ago
  Point sources won't scale to the size of the problem. Easier initially, but to replace fossil fuels for transportation and heating, will need to get the CO2 from the air.
  • D_Alex 7y ago
    >Easier initially... Then start with point sources initially. Considering a good portion of transportation and basically all of the heating can be replaced by electricity directly, you will not need to go beyond point sources anyway.
    • credit_guy 7y ago
      There is a much more efficient way to deal with point sources, if you have a clean energy source in their neighborhood: just shut them down and replace the energy they provide with the clean energy you would use to scrub the CO2 from the air.
      • D_Alex 7y ago
        Yes, sometimes this is practicable. But many locations do not have sufficient renewable energy available, and nuclear has become unpalatable for a variety of reasons. Scrubbing CO2 from boiler or turbine exhaust takes a small fraction (5%-ish) of the energy needed to convert it into fuel. If the source is a power plant, the CO2 can be captured at a cost of efficiency penalty of around 10%. Once it is captured, storing and transporting CO2 to a location with abundant clean energy is also relatively simple.