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Not a surprise, since co2 is an oxide, and therefore very stable in the athmosphere. It would take a huge amount of energy to remove it, and we don't even stop
by BiteCode_dev 4y ago
Not a surprise, since co2 is an oxide, and therefore very stable in the athmosphere. It would take a huge amount of energy to remove it, and we don't even stop putting it in there.
Janvici had a nice way to put it: the 1.5C are already signed for, which means we won't ever see the climate of today again in the next 5000 years.
- Tuna-Fish 4y ago> Not a surprise, since co2 is an oxide, and therefore very stable in the athmosphere. It would take a huge amount of energy to remove it, There is an exothermic reaction that removes CO2 from the atmosphere, the formation of carbonates from weathering of silicate rocks. As this is naturally very slow, there is currently ongoing research into multiple different ways to speed it up.
- macspoofing 4y agoThat doesn't change anything. You need a huge amount of energy to remove CO2 from the atmosphere because CO2 is a tiny constituent part of Air (~400ppm) - that means one has to move a million molecules of air across a collector (whatever that is) to remove 400 molecules of CO2. You can't do that without huge amounts of energy and a huge surface area for your collector ... on any human timescale.
- blueflow 4y agoPlants do. And they only need the sunlight they have where they grow.
- tomtomistaken 4y agoI think that’s the “huge surface” op is talking about.
- abyssin 4y agoAnd we’re busy decreasing the surface of woodlands on the planet.
- rowanG077 4y agoHuh I thought the world has more trees now then ever before.
- lazyasciiart 4y agoI don’t know, but they could both be true. How many 5yo pine trees does it take to equal the surface area of one giant redwood?
- googlryas 4y agoIt's really about growth rate rather than size.
- iostream25 4y ago
- Schroedingersat 4y agoThe mass of air that moves past the existing fleet of wind turbines in a year is roughly a fifth of the mass of the atmosphere. It is a civilisation sized project that will take a lifetime, but it is achievable.
- mjhay 4y agoOr we could just stop burning coal.
- googlryas 4y agoThat would be very easy if we didn't benefit greatly from burning coal
- mjhay 4y agoAre you familiar with the term "negative externalities?"
- googlryas 4y agoSure. But the benefit is way bigger than the drawback. At least that is the decision society has made.
- Schroedingersat 4y agoNo. People like David Koch benefit. The rest have very little say.
- SimbaOnSteroids 4y agoWhy do we talk about removing CO2 from the atmosphere but not trying to pull it out of the ocean?
- mjhay 4y agoWhat makes you think it would be significantly easier to filter out the carbolic acid from the ocean? The same difficulties apply, and water is much more viscous than air.
- SimbaOnSteroids 4y agoDidn’t carbon we’ve carelessly dumped in the atmosphere start as ocean life that sunk to the bottom, can’t we turbo charge that cycle?
- mjhay 4y agoNot practically. We are talking about huge scales, such that the industrial production, transport, etc., would be as much of an environmental disaster as what it's trying to solve.
- BiteCode_dev 4y agoBecause there is an homeostasic relationship between the co2 in the ocean and the air, and it always end up balancing out automatically.
- marcosdumay 4y agoOh man. Somebody always gets a way to make problems out of the entropy of diffusion. It increases with the log of the concentration, so whatever problem you estimate to happen, it can be worked around. On the case of silicates, a trivial work around is to just spread them around and let the same diffusion bring the CO2 into them.
- sslayer 4y agoAnd of course its not like we have giant windmill farms all over the world that we could integrate CO2 collectors into the blades
- loup-vaillant 4y agoI believe you meant Jancovici? https://jancovici.com/en/ https://jancovici.com/en/
- BiteCode_dev 4y agoYep, typo. I like the way he models the problem from first principles. Economic views have a tendency to hand wave the laws of thermodynamic.
- Yizahi 4y agoYeah, that the key problem - all current "green" or "zero" tech is simply a trick, with shuffling emissions to other countries, selling-buying quotas, maybe reducing emissions a little in the best case. Until we have a working industrial scale CO2 sequestration factories we are essentially doing nothing, or close to nothing.
- skrebbel 4y agoHow are solar panels or windmills a trick?
- null0ranje 4y agoI don't think solar panels or windmills are a trick, but I think OP was referring to "net zero" initiatives, which are not much more than accounting scams. Most carbon credits, if even verifiable, don't involve reductions but rather promises to not cut down existing forests for X years. Western countries are trying to do what they do best: buy their way out of a problem that takes actual effort.
- kettleballroll 4y agoThey're not removing co2 from the atmosphere. So they help reduce new emissions, but they don't help with the existing ones.
- lm28469 4y agobecause we use them additionally to existing sources, not as a replacement: https://www.cleanenergywire.org/sites/default/files/styles/gallery_image/public/paragraphs/images/fig1-installed-net-power-generation-capacity-germany-2002-2021.png?itok=k2BK48jz https://www.cleanenergywire.org/sites/default/files/styles/g... Less energy = less growth = recession = bad, we're stuck in that
- benj111 4y agoHow is it a 'trick'? Building a wind turbine isn't shuffling emissions anywhere. Neither is solar. Or a more efficient boiler, or....
- ElectronCharge 4y agoThe best way forward is to reject parts of the consensus Green approach. In particular, investment in nuclear, and a plan to augment wind+solar expansion with a large nuclear (and later fusion) buildout is the way to go. The rationale for this is that only by raising the living standard of the third world can the world’s population be stabilized without a major die-off (not to mention a reduced quality of life for just about everyone going forward). Further, only with massive amounts of clean energy can we clean up the ecosphere and effectively fight atmospheric CO2 buildup as needed. There are plenty of resources on Earth if they’re managed well. Only with plentiful energy can we afford to have treat the Earth as the precious resource it is - as we begin to inhabit the rest of the Solar System!
- zzzeek 4y agoother than the giant one staring at us 93 million miles away beaming massive amounts of energy directly at us all day, fusion reactors otherwise don't exist. Maybe not throw away all the other approaches until they do?
- meany 4y agoFrom my read, the previous poster does mention investing in nuclear, wind and solar. With potentially moving to fusion if it becomes available.
- ElectronCharge 4y agoSolar and wind have many issues. Intermittency, the need for rare earths, and low energy density leading to ecological impact are some. It’s also under-recognized that as those technologies are built out beyond a few percent of global power, supply issues will likely lead to large cost increases and potential scarcity. Then there’s the waste/recycling problem, which is worse than nuclear. I also was clear that fusion is a future solution.
- zzzeek 4y agoso your argument is "go nuclear, problem solved" ? I'm all for adding nuclear at this point but I dont know that the research supports the notion that an "all in for nuclear, done" approach would be effective.
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