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Cool, but carbon capture from the air is at best a tiny fraction of the solutions we need. Right now our time is better spent on emissions reduction. https://w

Cool, but carbon capture from the air is at best a tiny fraction of the solutions we need. Right now our time is better spent on emissions reduction. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00953-x https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00953-x

malux85 2y ago
Both, in parallel, theres enough humans and resources to work on both
- cheonic00193 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - CalRobert 2y ago
    Why not?
    - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
      Suppose you have any finite number of humans to work on the problem. Emissions reductions can be achieved in known ways at some relatively modest cost, e.g. the difference in cost between using fossil fuels and using electric cars or renewable/nuclear generation methods, which are already very close together in price and could be made closer or even cause the alternatives to cost less through certain types of engineering R&D or reasonable regulatory changes, and not only lower emissions but lower energy costs. Carbon capture requires a large amount of R&D which might not yield any useful results whatsoever, and if it did the result would be a reduction in cost from a level which is hopeless and preposterous to one where actually deploying it would still cost trillions of dollars in implementation and operating costs to have any meaningful effect, while producing no other economic value and almost certainly a vast amount of chemical waste. The difference in cost effectiveness is so vast that the optimal allocation of finite resources to the latter could plausibly be zero.
- atoav 2y ago
  I would generally agree with that statement. However in this case I disagree. Why? Because I think carbon capture sells the idea that with the right technology we could just continue doing what we are doing. It is the equivalent of an obese person stuffing food in their mouth and telling you fat can always be surgically removed. Yeah sure it can, to some degree, but you do see how that doesn't fix the problem? Do you see how them saying that might in fact be worse than them saying nothing? So in my mind carbon capture is something that we should work on if we are capable of the realization that the role it will play in fixing the problem is utterly insignificant. If you think it is the solution, carbon capture sells a false hope and prolongs the struggle — and at least where I am from proponents of carbon capture are the people who definitely don't want to reduce their CO2 output. Pointing at some future technology instead of doing something now is actively harmful. And I am not sure the actual positive effect of such technology would outweigh the negative effect it has as an excuse to justify not doing what is necessary now.
  - rayiner 2y ago
    > Because I think carbon capture sells the idea that with the right technology we could just continue doing what we are doing. It is the equivalent of an obese person stuffing food in their mouth and telling you fat can always be surgically removed. Yeah sure it can, to some degree, but you do see how that doesn't fix the problem? Do you see how them saying that might in fact be worse than them saying nothing? What you’re overlooking is that we will keep doing whatever we’re doing, for the same reason telling people to diet and exercise isn’t doing jack shit for the obesity crisis. We need Ozempic for the climate. Because the only alternative is 4C of warming.
    - Teever 2y ago
      If that's the case maybe we as a species should die? Or at least enough of the species that we change our behaviour for good? It's unfortunate that the ecosystem has to suffer.
      - tticvs 2y ago
        "The future looks somewhat difficult, better give up and go extinct" Fortunately natural selection will remove this mindset eventually. It's unfortunate that the species has to suffer it in the meantime.
- exyi 2y ago
  If we have enough resources dedicated to this problem, why are we still burning coal/gas for power on sunny days? I'm definitely not against researching carbon capture, but it currently isn't the "the solution the planet desperately needs"
  - icegreentea2 2y ago
    The resources going into carbon capture aren't the same resources going into renewable? The scale is also completely different. Bloomberg says global investment in carbon capture in 2022 was like $6.4 billion (https://about.bnef.com/blog/carbon-capture-investment-hits-record-high-of-6-4-billion/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/carbon-capture-investment-hits-r...). Bloomberg also says that global renewable investment in the first 6 months of 2023 was $358 billion (https://about.bnef.com/blog/renewable-energy-investment-hits-record-breaking-358-billion-in-1h-2023/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/renewable-energy-investment-hits...) Conversion of all carbon capture investment into more solar or wind capacity would not significantly move the needle on rate of renewable growth. Effectively all carbon capture investment right now is basically in the pilot phase. Governments are sinking money into carbon capture for a broad range of reasons, including cynical (as a smokescreen to protect fossil fuel industries) to optimistic (we can start investing in the next step of net-zero since renewable trajectories look good) to being realistic hedges (they see the challenges in achieving net zero in certain fields like aviation, shipping, construction, and believe that carbon capture is what is necessary to achieve net-zero).
- lordswork 2y ago
  If we have fixed resources, how should they be allocated? I'd argue for every million dollars towards reaching net zero emissions, we should maybe spend 1 dollar towards carbon capture, where we scale that investment up as we approach net zero emissions.
enriquto 2y ago
Carbon capture is obviously inconsequential; but it would seem that even emissions reduction is a useless endeavor, wouldn't it? All extracted carbon will be eventually burned. Burning it sooner or later it's not such a big deal. What we need to do, for a start, is to close the damn oil wells! Just stop unearthing millions of years worth of captured carbon and putting them back into the biosphere.
- AnthonyMouse 2y ago
  > All extracted carbon will be eventually burned. Extraction operates on supply and demand. When people stop demanding it, they'll stop digging it out of the ground. There are two ways to achieve this: 1) You make burning it more expensive (carbon tax). 2) You make alternatives to burning it cheaper. You can do both at once. In fact you want to, because the first one gives the second one economies of scale and the second one reduces the economic impact of the first one. Preventing extraction is pointless because it has the same effect as the first one except that instead of the money being collected as a tax that could be refunded to the population as a tax credit, it goes to the people who are still doing the remaining extraction. We could, however, stop subsidizing extraction.
  - exyi 2y ago
    > Preventing extraction is pointless because it has the same effect as the first one Yes, but it might raise oil prices, effectively making the carbon tax apply globally. Unless OPEC just compensates by increasing production. IMHO carbon tax indeed better tool for EU/US, given that most of oil production out of "our" control
    - mistrial9 2y ago
      > might raise oil prices, effectively making the carbon tax apply globally that statement upon examination does not pass scrutiny for weaslewords
    - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
      > Yes, but it might raise oil prices, effectively making the carbon tax apply globally. Which major countries could already do through tariffs on any country not collecting it, without giving the money to OPEC.
janalsncm 2y ago
His calculations are based off present day capabilities. The point of R&D is to create new capabilities. Solar also used to be a lot more expensive than it is today.
- curtisf 2y ago
  No, it will _never_ be feasible to collect and transport any meaningful amount of carbon out of the atmosphere. We emit 35 billion tons of carbon dioxide every year. That is more than 7x the amount of cement made each year (4.5 billion tons). More than 8x the amount of food that's made each year (about 4 billion tons). About 17x the amount of steel made each year (2 billion tons). About 60x the amount of plastic made each year (about 0.5 billion tons). But carbon is completely worthless. We can't build a logistics pipeline dedicated solely to moving a worthless substance that is larger than the rest of human logistics combined.
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    The only plausible result would be something along the lines of a photosynthesis hack to produce synthetic wood at a faster rate than natural processes, which would then have a market value because you could make boxes and couches and houses out of it. But then you could also use it as a renewable fuel and we'd be calling it biofuels instead of carbon capture.
    - user_7832 2y ago
      That's a very good point: commercializing the products of CO2 capture. I wonder if bio-engineering photosynthesis to speed it up is moderately feasible.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    >No, it will _never_ be feasible to collect and transport any meaningful amount of carbon out of the atmosphere. This is obviously utterly false, given how much CO2 has been absorbed each year by current gen CO2 absorption technology. >But carbon is completely worthless. Current Gen carbon absorbers turn CO2 into some of the most useful materials on earth, like food, building materials and raw materials for oils and plastics. Much of the current world logistics is already dedicated to transporting their products.
rpmisms 2y ago
[flagged]
- input_sh 2y ago
  Both of those emit much less CO2 per capita than the US. Heck, if India emitted 7x as much per capita, they'd still emit less than the US does.
  - rpmisms 2y ago
    That's simply false. China under-reports by a vast amount, so does India. Also completely discounting the shipping aspect, which embargos would fix.
    - input_sh 2y ago
      Well luckily I didn't consult either China's or India's own figures, but EU's, which addresses these concerns. > Bottom-up national emission inventories are therefore an essential component of reporting and tracking progress towards the goals of the Paris Agreement. However, national inventory reports are not yet available for all countries and years. In addition, they are dependent on individual national reporting processes and methodological choices, they can present data gaps for specific sectors and currently, except for Annex I parties, there is no obligation to include long-term series of emissions up to the most recent year. > The European Commission’s in-house Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR)7 offers an alternative to overcome these limitations and to complement national inventories and has the advantage of producing timely emission estimates that are comparable across countries. > EDGAR relies on several sources of international statistics for the underpinning data. Foremost among these is the International Energy Agency (IEA). To harmonise global GHG emission estimates, this booklet incorporates IEA CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion sources named IEA-EDGAR CO2 emission dataset (v2), which are complemented with in-house EDGAR estimates for CH4, N2O and F-gas emissions. PDF: https://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/booklet/GHG_emissions_of_all_world_countries_booklet_2023report.pdf https://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/booklet/GHG_emissions_of_all_...
    - 2y ago
llm_trw 2y ago
We have put enough CO2 in the atmosphere to melt the icecaps. The only thing worth doing now is converting everything to nuclear so we can scrub CO2 out of the atmosphere before industrial society becomes impossible. In short: even if we get the most fervent dreams of de-growth and live like cavewomen starting tomorrow we've still got a million years of global warming before we're back to pre-industrial levels.
- greenthrow 2y ago
  Nuclear is way too slow and carbon intensive. Solar and wind with battery storage make way more sense from every rational angle. They are cheaper, they are faster, they have less embedded carbon, they have far less tosk, etc. Nuclear has been getting hyped and pushed hard by big money interests but the truth is its time has come and gone abd it no longer makes any aense.
  - llm_trw 2y ago
    I've been hearing this for 20 years and I'll be hearing it until we die from global warming. The only thing that wind and solar have done is make the grid more unstable and make a lot of money for speculators on the power market. There is a reason why every country which has reduced nuclear power has increased its green house gas emissions.
    - hackerlight 2y ago
      Getting rid of nuclear is stupid but so is adding new nuclear. Firmed renewables with lithium ion batteries and pumped hydro makes the most financial sense since the 2020s, especially in the US which has less seasonal solar resources than Europe.
      - llm_trw 2y ago
        Again, I've been hearing that for 20 years and I'll be hearing it for 40 years until global warming knocks the internet off.
globalnode 2y ago
they wont give up on carbon capture fantasies because it means they can keep making buckets of money on free hydrocarbons...
gumby 2y ago
If the bathtub is overflowing you need to fix the broken tap and mop up the water that has already spilled. Yes, if you are the only person in the house, prioritize the tap, but if someone else is working the leak, grab a mop right away!
- Shrezzing 2y ago
  For the metaphor to reflect reality, the oil & gas industry is walking around the house breaking more taps, while saying that they'll get round to inventing a mop in the next few years.
- darby_eight 2y ago
  This metaphor would work a lot better if the tap were overflowing with cash.
- graemep 2y ago
  > and mop up the water that has already spilled. Not if the spilled water is running down the drain. If we stopped our CO2 emissions and nothing else changed CO2 levels in the atmosphere would start falling immediately as photosynthesis would capture carbon faster than natural sources emit it.
nonameiguess 2y ago
They're doing that, too. Everything Georgia Tech is working on with respect to climate: https://climatesolutions.gatech.edu/ https://climatesolutions.gatech.edu/ Go the tab for the subsection on transportation and you'll see they're working on ways to reduce emissions, too. They also provide the dashboard and tracker app for the Drawdown Georgia initiative, which was co-drafted by Georgia Tech and aims to eventually get to net zero emissions in the state.
BurningFrog 2y ago
Strong disagreement! Carbon capture is the only way to get back to pre industrial CO2 levels! Even if/when we emit zero CO2, the elevated levels would remain for many centuries!
- lordswork 2y ago
  We need both, but reaching zero emissions is far more urgent and cost effective (by many orders of magnitude) right now.
- adgjlsfhk1 2y ago
  the problem with carbon capture is that carbon capture with a grid that is over 10% fossil fuel is net negative. it's like fixing a broken tap by pointing a firehoze at it.
- darby_eight 2y ago
  What happens if we can't find a carbon capture method that works efficiently and at scale? We need about a million better plans than that to maintain any sense of sanity.
  - constantcrying 2y ago
    We already have carbon capture technology, which is deployed at mass scale and transforms carbon into some of the most useful resources on earth, like food, building materials, raw materials for fuels and plastics and much, much more. Given that this technology already is deployed over enormous stretches of the earth and that it actively benefits in its productivity from elevated levels of CO2 why not further that technology? CO2 isn't some poison in the atmosphere, it needs to be there. The one thing under control of humans is what percentage of Carbon is in the atmosphere or bound in different forms. The problem isn't too much CO2 in the atmosphere, it is that the amount of CO2 there can't be reabsorbed at a self regulating rate.

malux85 2y ago

Both, in parallel, theres enough humans and resources to work on both

cheonic00193 2y ago
[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- CalRobert 2y ago
  Why not?
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    Suppose you have any finite number of humans to work on the problem. Emissions reductions can be achieved in known ways at some relatively modest cost, e.g. the difference in cost between using fossil fuels and using electric cars or renewable/nuclear generation methods, which are already very close together in price and could be made closer or even cause the alternatives to cost less through certain types of engineering R&D or reasonable regulatory changes, and not only lower emissions but lower energy costs. Carbon capture requires a large amount of R&D which might not yield any useful results whatsoever, and if it did the result would be a reduction in cost from a level which is hopeless and preposterous to one where actually deploying it would still cost trillions of dollars in implementation and operating costs to have any meaningful effect, while producing no other economic value and almost certainly a vast amount of chemical waste. The difference in cost effectiveness is so vast that the optimal allocation of finite resources to the latter could plausibly be zero.
atoav 2y ago
I would generally agree with that statement. However in this case I disagree. Why? Because I think carbon capture sells the idea that with the right technology we could just continue doing what we are doing. It is the equivalent of an obese person stuffing food in their mouth and telling you fat can always be surgically removed. Yeah sure it can, to some degree, but you do see how that doesn't fix the problem? Do you see how them saying that might in fact be worse than them saying nothing? So in my mind carbon capture is something that we should work on if we are capable of the realization that the role it will play in fixing the problem is utterly insignificant. If you think it is the solution, carbon capture sells a false hope and prolongs the struggle — and at least where I am from proponents of carbon capture are the people who definitely don't want to reduce their CO2 output. Pointing at some future technology instead of doing something now is actively harmful. And I am not sure the actual positive effect of such technology would outweigh the negative effect it has as an excuse to justify not doing what is necessary now.
- rayiner 2y ago
  > Because I think carbon capture sells the idea that with the right technology we could just continue doing what we are doing. It is the equivalent of an obese person stuffing food in their mouth and telling you fat can always be surgically removed. Yeah sure it can, to some degree, but you do see how that doesn't fix the problem? Do you see how them saying that might in fact be worse than them saying nothing? What you’re overlooking is that we will keep doing whatever we’re doing, for the same reason telling people to diet and exercise isn’t doing jack shit for the obesity crisis. We need Ozempic for the climate. Because the only alternative is 4C of warming.
  - Teever 2y ago
    If that's the case maybe we as a species should die? Or at least enough of the species that we change our behaviour for good? It's unfortunate that the ecosystem has to suffer.
    - tticvs 2y ago
      "The future looks somewhat difficult, better give up and go extinct" Fortunately natural selection will remove this mindset eventually. It's unfortunate that the species has to suffer it in the meantime.
exyi 2y ago
If we have enough resources dedicated to this problem, why are we still burning coal/gas for power on sunny days? I'm definitely not against researching carbon capture, but it currently isn't the "the solution the planet desperately needs"
- icegreentea2 2y ago
  The resources going into carbon capture aren't the same resources going into renewable? The scale is also completely different. Bloomberg says global investment in carbon capture in 2022 was like $6.4 billion (https://about.bnef.com/blog/carbon-capture-investment-hits-record-high-of-6-4-billion/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/carbon-capture-investment-hits-r...). Bloomberg also says that global renewable investment in the first 6 months of 2023 was $358 billion (https://about.bnef.com/blog/renewable-energy-investment-hits-record-breaking-358-billion-in-1h-2023/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/renewable-energy-investment-hits...) Conversion of all carbon capture investment into more solar or wind capacity would not significantly move the needle on rate of renewable growth. Effectively all carbon capture investment right now is basically in the pilot phase. Governments are sinking money into carbon capture for a broad range of reasons, including cynical (as a smokescreen to protect fossil fuel industries) to optimistic (we can start investing in the next step of net-zero since renewable trajectories look good) to being realistic hedges (they see the challenges in achieving net zero in certain fields like aviation, shipping, construction, and believe that carbon capture is what is necessary to achieve net-zero).
lordswork 2y ago
If we have fixed resources, how should they be allocated? I'd argue for every million dollars towards reaching net zero emissions, we should maybe spend 1 dollar towards carbon capture, where we scale that investment up as we approach net zero emissions.

enriquto 2y ago

Carbon capture is obviously inconsequential; but it would seem that even emissions reduction is a useless endeavor, wouldn't it? All extracted carbon will be eventually burned. Burning it sooner or later it's not such a big deal. What we need to do, for a start, is to close the damn oil wells! Just stop unearthing millions of years worth of captured carbon and putting them back into the biosphere.

AnthonyMouse 2y ago
> All extracted carbon will be eventually burned. Extraction operates on supply and demand. When people stop demanding it, they'll stop digging it out of the ground. There are two ways to achieve this: 1) You make burning it more expensive (carbon tax). 2) You make alternatives to burning it cheaper. You can do both at once. In fact you want to, because the first one gives the second one economies of scale and the second one reduces the economic impact of the first one. Preventing extraction is pointless because it has the same effect as the first one except that instead of the money being collected as a tax that could be refunded to the population as a tax credit, it goes to the people who are still doing the remaining extraction. We could, however, stop subsidizing extraction.
- exyi 2y ago
  > Preventing extraction is pointless because it has the same effect as the first one Yes, but it might raise oil prices, effectively making the carbon tax apply globally. Unless OPEC just compensates by increasing production. IMHO carbon tax indeed better tool for EU/US, given that most of oil production out of "our" control
  - mistrial9 2y ago
    > might raise oil prices, effectively making the carbon tax apply globally that statement upon examination does not pass scrutiny for weaslewords
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    > Yes, but it might raise oil prices, effectively making the carbon tax apply globally. Which major countries could already do through tariffs on any country not collecting it, without giving the money to OPEC.

janalsncm 2y ago

His calculations are based off present day capabilities. The point of R&D is to create new capabilities. Solar also used to be a lot more expensive than it is today.

curtisf 2y ago
No, it will _never_ be feasible to collect and transport any meaningful amount of carbon out of the atmosphere. We emit 35 billion tons of carbon dioxide every year. That is more than 7x the amount of cement made each year (4.5 billion tons). More than 8x the amount of food that's made each year (about 4 billion tons). About 17x the amount of steel made each year (2 billion tons). About 60x the amount of plastic made each year (about 0.5 billion tons). But carbon is completely worthless. We can't build a logistics pipeline dedicated solely to moving a worthless substance that is larger than the rest of human logistics combined.
- AnthonyMouse 2y ago
  The only plausible result would be something along the lines of a photosynthesis hack to produce synthetic wood at a faster rate than natural processes, which would then have a market value because you could make boxes and couches and houses out of it. But then you could also use it as a renewable fuel and we'd be calling it biofuels instead of carbon capture.
  - user_7832 2y ago
    That's a very good point: commercializing the products of CO2 capture. I wonder if bio-engineering photosynthesis to speed it up is moderately feasible.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  >No, it will _never_ be feasible to collect and transport any meaningful amount of carbon out of the atmosphere. This is obviously utterly false, given how much CO2 has been absorbed each year by current gen CO2 absorption technology. >But carbon is completely worthless. Current Gen carbon absorbers turn CO2 into some of the most useful materials on earth, like food, building materials and raw materials for oils and plastics. Much of the current world logistics is already dedicated to transporting their products.

rpmisms 2y ago

[flagged]

input_sh 2y ago
Both of those emit much less CO2 per capita than the US. Heck, if India emitted 7x as much per capita, they'd still emit less than the US does.
- rpmisms 2y ago
  That's simply false. China under-reports by a vast amount, so does India. Also completely discounting the shipping aspect, which embargos would fix.
  - input_sh 2y ago
    Well luckily I didn't consult either China's or India's own figures, but EU's, which addresses these concerns. > Bottom-up national emission inventories are therefore an essential component of reporting and tracking progress towards the goals of the Paris Agreement. However, national inventory reports are not yet available for all countries and years. In addition, they are dependent on individual national reporting processes and methodological choices, they can present data gaps for specific sectors and currently, except for Annex I parties, there is no obligation to include long-term series of emissions up to the most recent year. > The European Commission’s in-house Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR)7 offers an alternative to overcome these limitations and to complement national inventories and has the advantage of producing timely emission estimates that are comparable across countries. > EDGAR relies on several sources of international statistics for the underpinning data. Foremost among these is the International Energy Agency (IEA). To harmonise global GHG emission estimates, this booklet incorporates IEA CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion sources named IEA-EDGAR CO2 emission dataset (v2), which are complemented with in-house EDGAR estimates for CH4, N2O and F-gas emissions. PDF: https://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/booklet/GHG_emissions_of_all_world_countries_booklet_2023report.pdf https://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/booklet/GHG_emissions_of_all_...
  - 2y ago

llm_trw 2y ago

We have put enough CO2 in the atmosphere to melt the icecaps. The only thing worth doing now is converting everything to nuclear so we can scrub CO2 out of the atmosphere before industrial society becomes impossible. In short: even if we get the most fervent dreams of de-growth and live like cavewomen starting tomorrow we've still got a million years of global warming before we're back to pre-industrial levels.

greenthrow 2y ago
Nuclear is way too slow and carbon intensive. Solar and wind with battery storage make way more sense from every rational angle. They are cheaper, they are faster, they have less embedded carbon, they have far less tosk, etc. Nuclear has been getting hyped and pushed hard by big money interests but the truth is its time has come and gone abd it no longer makes any aense.
- llm_trw 2y ago
  I've been hearing this for 20 years and I'll be hearing it until we die from global warming. The only thing that wind and solar have done is make the grid more unstable and make a lot of money for speculators on the power market. There is a reason why every country which has reduced nuclear power has increased its green house gas emissions.
  - hackerlight 2y ago
    Getting rid of nuclear is stupid but so is adding new nuclear. Firmed renewables with lithium ion batteries and pumped hydro makes the most financial sense since the 2020s, especially in the US which has less seasonal solar resources than Europe.
    - llm_trw 2y ago
      Again, I've been hearing that for 20 years and I'll be hearing it for 40 years until global warming knocks the internet off.

globalnode 2y ago

they wont give up on carbon capture fantasies because it means they can keep making buckets of money on free hydrocarbons...

gumby 2y ago

If the bathtub is overflowing you need to fix the broken tap and mop up the water that has already spilled. Yes, if you are the only person in the house, prioritize the tap, but if someone else is working the leak, grab a mop right away!

Shrezzing 2y ago
For the metaphor to reflect reality, the oil & gas industry is walking around the house breaking more taps, while saying that they'll get round to inventing a mop in the next few years.
darby_eight 2y ago
This metaphor would work a lot better if the tap were overflowing with cash.
graemep 2y ago
> and mop up the water that has already spilled. Not if the spilled water is running down the drain. If we stopped our CO2 emissions and nothing else changed CO2 levels in the atmosphere would start falling immediately as photosynthesis would capture carbon faster than natural sources emit it.

nonameiguess 2y ago

They're doing that, too. Everything Georgia Tech is working on with respect to climate: https://climatesolutions.gatech.edu/ https://climatesolutions.gatech.edu/ Go the tab for the subsection on transportation and you'll see they're working on ways to reduce emissions, too. They also provide the dashboard and tracker app for the Drawdown Georgia initiative, which was co-drafted by Georgia Tech and aims to eventually get to net zero emissions in the state.

BurningFrog 2y ago

Strong disagreement! Carbon capture is the only way to get back to pre industrial CO2 levels! Even if/when we emit zero CO2, the elevated levels would remain for many centuries!

lordswork 2y ago
We need both, but reaching zero emissions is far more urgent and cost effective (by many orders of magnitude) right now.
adgjlsfhk1 2y ago
the problem with carbon capture is that carbon capture with a grid that is over 10% fossil fuel is net negative. it's like fixing a broken tap by pointing a firehoze at it.
darby_eight 2y ago
What happens if we can't find a carbon capture method that works efficiently and at scale? We need about a million better plans than that to maintain any sense of sanity.
- constantcrying 2y ago
  We already have carbon capture technology, which is deployed at mass scale and transforms carbon into some of the most useful resources on earth, like food, building materials, raw materials for fuels and plastics and much, much more. Given that this technology already is deployed over enormous stretches of the earth and that it actively benefits in its productivity from elevated levels of CO2 why not further that technology? CO2 isn't some poison in the atmosphere, it needs to be there. The one thing under control of humans is what percentage of Carbon is in the atmosphere or bound in different forms. The problem isn't too much CO2 in the atmosphere, it is that the amount of CO2 there can't be reabsorbed at a self regulating rate.