8 ms·

What would happen to the hydrocarbons? If they are burned for fuel, the CO2 would go right back into the environment.

quickthrower2 3y ago
I imagine once you have the nice problem of all planet earth energy coming from renewables, you could start pumping the fuels underground?
- __MatrixMan__ 3y ago
  I'm sure the chemists can come up with something in the ballpark of graphite/wood/carbon fiber which we can use as a building material so that we can stop cutting down trees to make our houses.
  - quickthrower2 3y ago
    I like that idea. Although a sustainable forest also takes carbon out of the atmosphere. (Same for any trees that would have been burned for fire control). We just need to make sure we are not using trees we didn't plant or have to destroy anyway.
aimonster2 3y ago
More plants. Eventually, we'd be down to using just pure hydrogen since the CO2 levels would be just right for plant growth, so no need to capture any more.
tzs 3y ago
That's fine. If you take a ton of CO2 out of the atmosphere, make fuel out of it, and someone burns that fuel instead of burning fossil fuel whose C did not come from the recent atmosphere then the net result is that we end up with a ton less CO2 in the atmosphere than we would have had if they had burned the old C fossil fuel. Fuel made from atmospheric CO2 using clean energy is essentially a disposable battery for storing that clean energy that automatically recycles itself when it is used.
- yetihehe 3y ago
  If we could at least stop pumping carbon from underground into atmosphere and replace it with carbon already in atmosphere, it would help a lot.
  - loceng 3y ago
    How would it help a lot? The issue with burning things is the pollution it can cause if not filtered properly before emissions released into the air. CO2 feeds plants to grow, which in turn provides more food and habitat for more life. An incongruence in the West vs. the East's strategy is that we in the West have avoided nuclear - which generates zero CO2 - whereas the East's CO2 production (via building new coal power plants weekly) - has been skyrocketing: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-country?country=CHN~USA~CAN~MEX~DEU~FRA~GBR https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-... In this scenario with China doing the opposite to the rest of the world, there are exactly zero gains for CO2 reduction - far outweighed by the increase in CO2 production. And in this scenario as well the "polluter" or generator of the most CO2 is being rewarded for their behaviour by producing the cheapest energy possible, which allows their cost of production to be lower than the West, which allows their profits to be higher - for us to buy cheaper products to not only perpetuate but accelerate these current conditions.
    - baq 3y ago
      CO2 is also a greenhouse gas and makes our atmosphere store much more energy than it used to which destabilizes ecosystems in which those plants you want to grow bigger actually live. So yeah, they’ll grow faster, and then they’ll all die. The rest of your argument is orthogonal to the issue. Taking CO2 out of the atmosphere works globally, it doesn’t matter who does or doesn’t reduce emissions.
      - loceng 3y ago
        "CO2 is also a greenhouse gas and makes our atmosphere store much more energy than it used to which destabilizes ecosystems in which those plants you want to grow bigger actually live. So yeah, they’ll grow faster, and then they’ll all die." There may be a delay but then the CO2 gets absorbed and stored in the plants, and then in more animals that will be added mass to the cycles - the plants dying then goes into the soil, to support more growth, and eventually over millions of years that Earth gets compacted - turned into rock, then arguably more oil will be formed. Your point doesn't argue anything because you stopped-didn't think exponentially through the cycle after they "die" part in the cycle - what happens next? "The rest of your argument is orthogonal to the issue. Taking CO2 out of the atmosphere works globally, it doesn’t matter who does or doesn’t reduce emissions." So you don't think the West "being responsible by reducing CO2" - getting hurt by costs going up - while the East massively increases CO2 production and gets rewarded by doing so, doesn't have an impact? Please actually address my specific points, rather than just making a general claim if you want to continue discussing this.
retrac 3y ago
It's effectively a closed cycle, just using the atmosphere as a buffer.

I imagine once you have the nice problem of all planet earth energy coming from renewables, you could start pumping the fuels underground?

__MatrixMan__ 3y ago
I'm sure the chemists can come up with something in the ballpark of graphite/wood/carbon fiber which we can use as a building material so that we can stop cutting down trees to make our houses.
- quickthrower2 3y ago
  I like that idea. Although a sustainable forest also takes carbon out of the atmosphere. (Same for any trees that would have been burned for fire control). We just need to make sure we are not using trees we didn't plant or have to destroy anyway.

aimonster2 3y ago

More plants. Eventually, we'd be down to using just pure hydrogen since the CO2 levels would be just right for plant growth, so no need to capture any more.

tzs 3y ago

That's fine. If you take a ton of CO2 out of the atmosphere, make fuel out of it, and someone burns that fuel instead of burning fossil fuel whose C did not come from the recent atmosphere then the net result is that we end up with a ton less CO2 in the atmosphere than we would have had if they had burned the old C fossil fuel. Fuel made from atmospheric CO2 using clean energy is essentially a disposable battery for storing that clean energy that automatically recycles itself when it is used.

yetihehe 3y ago
If we could at least stop pumping carbon from underground into atmosphere and replace it with carbon already in atmosphere, it would help a lot.
- loceng 3y ago
  How would it help a lot? The issue with burning things is the pollution it can cause if not filtered properly before emissions released into the air. CO2 feeds plants to grow, which in turn provides more food and habitat for more life. An incongruence in the West vs. the East's strategy is that we in the West have avoided nuclear - which generates zero CO2 - whereas the East's CO2 production (via building new coal power plants weekly) - has been skyrocketing: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-country?country=CHN~USA~CAN~MEX~DEU~FRA~GBR https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-... In this scenario with China doing the opposite to the rest of the world, there are exactly zero gains for CO2 reduction - far outweighed by the increase in CO2 production. And in this scenario as well the "polluter" or generator of the most CO2 is being rewarded for their behaviour by producing the cheapest energy possible, which allows their cost of production to be lower than the West, which allows their profits to be higher - for us to buy cheaper products to not only perpetuate but accelerate these current conditions.
  - baq 3y ago
    CO2 is also a greenhouse gas and makes our atmosphere store much more energy than it used to which destabilizes ecosystems in which those plants you want to grow bigger actually live. So yeah, they’ll grow faster, and then they’ll all die. The rest of your argument is orthogonal to the issue. Taking CO2 out of the atmosphere works globally, it doesn’t matter who does or doesn’t reduce emissions.
    - loceng 3y ago
      "CO2 is also a greenhouse gas and makes our atmosphere store much more energy than it used to which destabilizes ecosystems in which those plants you want to grow bigger actually live. So yeah, they’ll grow faster, and then they’ll all die." There may be a delay but then the CO2 gets absorbed and stored in the plants, and then in more animals that will be added mass to the cycles - the plants dying then goes into the soil, to support more growth, and eventually over millions of years that Earth gets compacted - turned into rock, then arguably more oil will be formed. Your point doesn't argue anything because you stopped-didn't think exponentially through the cycle after they "die" part in the cycle - what happens next? "The rest of your argument is orthogonal to the issue. Taking CO2 out of the atmosphere works globally, it doesn’t matter who does or doesn’t reduce emissions." So you don't think the West "being responsible by reducing CO2" - getting hurt by costs going up - while the East massively increases CO2 production and gets rewarded by doing so, doesn't have an impact? Please actually address my specific points, rather than just making a general claim if you want to continue discussing this.

retrac 3y ago

It's effectively a closed cycle, just using the atmosphere as a buffer.