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How on earth is this ever going to be economically feasible. Wouldn’t it be more economically viable to literally just bury paper in the ground, or like simply

by cglan 3y ago

How on earth is this ever going to be economically feasible. Wouldn’t it be more economically viable to literally just bury paper in the ground, or like simply not use the carbon in the first place?

dottjt 3y ago
How on earth could you possibly make an economic argument on the future viability of our species on this planet? It's because of economics we're in this mess in the first place.
- Dylan16807 3y ago
  Huh? Even with extremely important life-saving goals, you still want to use a cost-effective method to get there. Also if it was actually expensive enough, we'd simply be doomed. Economics can't be ignored. They're a proxy for how much we can accomplish.
  - dottjt 3y ago
    I agree in principle, but my question to you, is how do we make something economic i.e. CO2 pollution, which in principle provides no value? The same goes for fossil fuel consumption. There's nothing economic about not using fossil fuels. Understandably it's a compromise, but the first reaction shouldn't be "it costs too much, so don't do it". This attitude is the reason why nothing ends up getting done. I would much rather an uneconomic solution, than no solution at all, which seemingly is the status quo.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      Taxes are one straightforward way. But no matter how you're paying for it, if you have method A and method B, and they'd both do the job, you don't pick the one that costs 5x as much because you think economic arguments are a bad thing.
  - sspiff 3y ago
    That's an extremely sad point of view. Of course humans can accomplish things that are not economically viable. Perhaps it's become harder in our current society, but many great projects of man were economic folly. To give one admittedly a little cliche example, landing on the moon never made any economic sense.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      That's not what I'm talking about. Pretend getting to the moon would have cost a quadrillion dollars. We wouldn't have been able to do it.
      - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > Pretend getting to the moon would have cost a quadrillion dollars. We wouldn't have been able to do it. This is a statement of reality, not economic system. A society that decided to divert resources, today, to building a Dyson sphere on Alpha Centauri would fail, irrespective of economic system, because the goal demands more resources than it can sustainably divert.
        Dylan16807 3y ago
        > This is a statement of reality, not economic system. Yes, that's my point. The worry about "economically feasible" in the ancestor comment is a question of what plans are realistic with unlimited motivation. It's not about economic systems holding us back.
- s1artibartfast 3y ago
  That's silly. That's like condemning logic or mathematics. If you want future viability, you can ask if there is a cheap way or an expensive way to get what you want. That's economics. It says nothing about what your goal is.
  - dottjt 3y ago
    You're forgetting a key factor though: politics. What you're arguing is a rational idea of economics that doesn't exist. Instead, we have this bastard version influenced by politics, which in practice, cares nothing of the key objectives which concern future viability. Instead, we get this thing that demands infinite growth and consumption. That's modern economics and it's destroying us.
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > we get this thing that demands infinite growth and consumption. That's modern economics This is a stylised misinterpretation of economics.
    - s1artibartfast 3y ago
      so you are just saying that you dont like a particular brand of politics.
arnvald 3y ago
This is a first of its kind, I'm sure over time they'll become more efficient. But yes, probably not using carbon would be better, so maybe if we have proper capabilities and laws in place, companies might be forced to remove all the carbon they release - that will either make them pay for such service or push towards reducing carbon as much as possible
ISL 3y ago
The last one, not burning it in the first place, is the thermodynamically-easiest thing to do. However, there's already a lot of CO2 in the air, and we'll be wise to pull that out, too, so the impacts of warming are blunted. Part of the way people will begin to vote for carbon-usage restrictions is when they begin to discover exactly how expensive it will be to remove from the air. The big catalyst, of course, is when they begin to personally feel acute effects of climate-change. This [1] was my catalytic moment. Everyone's will be different, but we're each going to have one or more experiences that change our view on fossil fuels. [1]: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cw09t0gPAwm/ https://www.instagram.com/p/Cw09t0gPAwm/
LispSporks22 3y ago
Well, I think they'll move the whole thing to a nearby coal or gas power station and fit over the chimney stack. After all, that's where the CO2 is concentrated. It wouldn't make sense to suck CO2 out of the atmosphere as a trace molecule at 430 PPM - that would be stupid. Hopefully they plan to miniaturize the technology and fit it over transportation exhausts and wherever else we're dumping out CO2 in high concentrations.
icelancer 3y ago
> simply not use the carbon in the first place No one is disputing this is obviously the best move. But telling humans not to consume stuff has a rather long and unsuccessful history. Let's not try to keep doing that.
ruined 3y ago
turning trees into paper is too slow. anything you can do with trees is too slow, actually. if carbon capture is undertaken seriously enough to just break even at current burn, the storage alone will be the largest industrial project in human history. if we somehow stop burning carbon tomorrow we will still see catastrophic change as the carbon we've already emitted takes effect. the beginning of any solution is to stop, but nobody can afford to stop.
- blencdr 3y ago
  Wouldn't it be simpler to plant trees instead of using energy to capture carbon? To absorb 1000 tons of CO2 a year, you'd need roughly 200 acres of land, which seems more feasible.

by cglan 3y ago

dottjt 3y ago

How on earth could you possibly make an economic argument on the future viability of our species on this planet? It's because of economics we're in this mess in the first place.

Dylan16807 3y ago
Huh? Even with extremely important life-saving goals, you still want to use a cost-effective method to get there. Also if it was actually expensive enough, we'd simply be doomed. Economics can't be ignored. They're a proxy for how much we can accomplish.
- dottjt 3y ago
  I agree in principle, but my question to you, is how do we make something economic i.e. CO2 pollution, which in principle provides no value? The same goes for fossil fuel consumption. There's nothing economic about not using fossil fuels. Understandably it's a compromise, but the first reaction shouldn't be "it costs too much, so don't do it". This attitude is the reason why nothing ends up getting done. I would much rather an uneconomic solution, than no solution at all, which seemingly is the status quo.
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    Taxes are one straightforward way. But no matter how you're paying for it, if you have method A and method B, and they'd both do the job, you don't pick the one that costs 5x as much because you think economic arguments are a bad thing.
- sspiff 3y ago
  That's an extremely sad point of view. Of course humans can accomplish things that are not economically viable. Perhaps it's become harder in our current society, but many great projects of man were economic folly. To give one admittedly a little cliche example, landing on the moon never made any economic sense.
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    That's not what I'm talking about. Pretend getting to the moon would have cost a quadrillion dollars. We wouldn't have been able to do it.
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > Pretend getting to the moon would have cost a quadrillion dollars. We wouldn't have been able to do it. This is a statement of reality, not economic system. A society that decided to divert resources, today, to building a Dyson sphere on Alpha Centauri would fail, irrespective of economic system, because the goal demands more resources than it can sustainably divert.
      - Dylan16807 3y ago
        > This is a statement of reality, not economic system. Yes, that's my point. The worry about "economically feasible" in the ancestor comment is a question of what plans are realistic with unlimited motivation. It's not about economic systems holding us back.
s1artibartfast 3y ago
That's silly. That's like condemning logic or mathematics. If you want future viability, you can ask if there is a cheap way or an expensive way to get what you want. That's economics. It says nothing about what your goal is.
- dottjt 3y ago
  You're forgetting a key factor though: politics. What you're arguing is a rational idea of economics that doesn't exist. Instead, we have this bastard version influenced by politics, which in practice, cares nothing of the key objectives which concern future viability. Instead, we get this thing that demands infinite growth and consumption. That's modern economics and it's destroying us.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > we get this thing that demands infinite growth and consumption. That's modern economics This is a stylised misinterpretation of economics.
  - s1artibartfast 3y ago
    so you are just saying that you dont like a particular brand of politics.

arnvald 3y ago

This is a first of its kind, I'm sure over time they'll become more efficient. But yes, probably not using carbon would be better, so maybe if we have proper capabilities and laws in place, companies might be forced to remove all the carbon they release - that will either make them pay for such service or push towards reducing carbon as much as possible

ISL 3y ago

The last one, not burning it in the first place, is the thermodynamically-easiest thing to do. However, there's already a lot of CO2 in the air, and we'll be wise to pull that out, too, so the impacts of warming are blunted. Part of the way people will begin to vote for carbon-usage restrictions is when they begin to discover exactly how expensive it will be to remove from the air. The big catalyst, of course, is when they begin to personally feel acute effects of climate-change. This [1] was my catalytic moment. Everyone's will be different, but we're each going to have one or more experiences that change our view on fossil fuels. [1]: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cw09t0gPAwm/ https://www.instagram.com/p/Cw09t0gPAwm/

LispSporks22 3y ago

Well, I think they'll move the whole thing to a nearby coal or gas power station and fit over the chimney stack. After all, that's where the CO2 is concentrated. It wouldn't make sense to suck CO2 out of the atmosphere as a trace molecule at 430 PPM - that would be stupid. Hopefully they plan to miniaturize the technology and fit it over transportation exhausts and wherever else we're dumping out CO2 in high concentrations.

icelancer 3y ago

> simply not use the carbon in the first place No one is disputing this is obviously the best move. But telling humans not to consume stuff has a rather long and unsuccessful history. Let's not try to keep doing that.

ruined 3y ago

turning trees into paper is too slow. anything you can do with trees is too slow, actually. if carbon capture is undertaken seriously enough to just break even at current burn, the storage alone will be the largest industrial project in human history. if we somehow stop burning carbon tomorrow we will still see catastrophic change as the carbon we've already emitted takes effect. the beginning of any solution is to stop, but nobody can afford to stop.

blencdr 3y ago
Wouldn't it be simpler to plant trees instead of using energy to capture carbon? To absorb 1000 tons of CO2 a year, you'd need roughly 200 acres of land, which seems more feasible.