Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by mrpg on Wednesday June 13 2018, @04:31AM   Printer-friendly
from the hot-on-the-heels-of-fresh-water-from-air dept.

Sucking carbon dioxide from air is cheaper than scientists thought

Siphoning carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere could be more than an expensive last-ditch strategy for averting climate catastrophe. A detailed economic analysis published on 7 June suggests that the geoengineering technology is inching closer to commercial viability.

The study, in Joule, was written by researchers at Carbon Engineering in Calgary, Canada, which has been operating a pilot CO2-extraction plant in British Columbia since 2015. That plant — based on a concept called direct air capture — provided the basis for the economic analysis, which includes cost estimates from commercial vendors of all of the major components. Depending on a variety of design options and economic assumptions, the cost of pulling a tonne of CO2 from the atmosphere ranges between US$94 and $232. The last comprehensive analysis of the technology, conducted by the American Physical Society in 2011, estimated that it would cost $600 per tonne.

Carbon Engineering says that it published the paper to advance discussions about the cost and potential of the technology. "We're really trying to commercialize direct air capture in a serious way, and to do that, you have to have everybody in the supply chain on board," says David Keith, acting chief scientist at Carbon Engineering and a climate physicist at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

A Process for Capturing CO2 from the Atmosphere (DOI: 10.1016/j.joule.2018.05.006) (DX)

Direct Air Capture of CO2 with Chemicals (2011)


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:09AM (17 children)

    by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:09AM (#692229) Homepage Journal

    Something like bamboo or kudzu would be better if space weren't a problem. They take up more area but they also suck up carbon a whole lot quicker because of their rapid growth.

    --
    My rights don't end where your fear begins.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +3  
       Insightful=3, Total=3
    Extra 'Insightful' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   5  
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:28AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:28AM (#692236)

    Kudzu, the borg of plants. Google for cooking recipes.

  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:47AM (11 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:47AM (#692242) Journal

    Both of them require a fairly good amount of rain.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    • (Score: 2, Insightful) by tftp on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:55AM (10 children)

      by tftp (806) on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:55AM (#692243) Homepage
      Better rain than fuel to power those air factories. The comment above is correct: first they deforested lots of land gaining profit, and now going to undo the harm making profit as well.
      • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday June 13 2018, @06:18AM (8 children)

        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday June 13 2018, @06:18AM (#692248) Journal

        Don't get me wrong, I agree with the idea of vegetation as a carbon sink. I only pointed that bamboo/kudzu aren't the appropriate one for many geo areas.

        Better rain than fuel to power those air factories.

        I wouldn't be so sure, it depends. If you have low rain fall [abc.net.au], it's not gonna work well with fast growers.
        Besides, if you have good rainfall, you may still want to grow something you can eat in the area.

        If we don’t have enough water, then we aren’t going to be able to grow plantations that will effectively absorb more CO2 from the atmosphere. And that could be a big problem. That’s what I consider to be the big yellow warning light, that says proceed with caution.

        --
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
        • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday June 13 2018, @03:26PM (7 children)

          by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Wednesday June 13 2018, @03:26PM (#692359) Homepage Journal

          Quite true but carbon sinks don't have to be geographically homogenous. It's no big deal to put most of them in places where water is abundant.

          --
          My rights don't end where your fear begins.
          • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday June 13 2018, @03:47PM (6 children)

            by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday June 13 2018, @03:47PM (#692377) Journal

            It's no big deal to put most of them in places where water is abundant.

            In the rice paddies or in the (freshly established after slash and burn deforestation [theguardian.com]) coconut plantations, where do you think it will be a smaller deal?

            --
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
            • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday June 13 2018, @03:57PM

              by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Wednesday June 13 2018, @03:57PM (#692384) Homepage Journal

              The best way to do things would be build man-made islands, cover them with $vegitation_of_choice, and ship/pipe in water from the continent's largest river (near the mouth so you're not depleting anything but the brackish area that's slightly downstream). Gets you your carbon sink and doesn't leave you having to worry about invasive vegetation species.

              --
              My rights don't end where your fear begins.
            • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday June 13 2018, @04:11PM (4 children)

              by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Wednesday June 13 2018, @04:11PM (#692387) Homepage Journal

              Oh, wait, I get it now. You're wanting something of value without it costing anything. Not going to happen. You're either going to have to pay farmers to grow the vegetation on already cleared land, clear more land and pay new farmers, or go with the technological way where you also have to pay. You'll probably want it paid for by the government (read: tax payers) whichever you pick though, knowing you.

              --
              My rights don't end where your fear begins.
              • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:15PM (3 children)

                by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:15PM (#692413) Journal

                You'll probably want it paid for by the government (read: tax payers) whichever you pick though, knowing you.

                Wrong as usual, you know dinky-shit about me, mate

                Oh, wait, I get it now. You're wanting something of value without it costing anything.

                I want more that fishing-chair handwaving solutions, like the one about building artificial islands.

                Something like: how about stopping deforestation? How about intensive (as opposed to extensive) agricultural practices - permaculture, crop rotation and the like? How about having each home build with high energy conservation rating/low energy footprint as opposed to profit maximization in mind?
                How about returning to durable goods as opposed to planned-obsolescence practices? (up until 1 year ago I was still happily using a 7yo dumb-mobile, I only needed to switch to a smart one because of "two factor auth" for telecommuting).

                How about searching for other solutions? Here [nature.com], for example

                In February 2004, researchers involved in the European Iron Fertilization Experiment (EIFEX) fertilized 167 square kilometres of the Southern Ocean with several tonnes of iron sulphate. For 37 days, the team on board the German research vessel Polarstern monitored the bloom and demise of single-cell algae (phytoplankton) in the iron-limited but otherwise nutrient-rich ocean region.

                Each atom of added iron pulled at least 13,000 atoms of carbon out of the atmosphere by encouraging algal growth which, through photosynthesis, captures carbon. In a paper in Nature today, the team reports that much of the captured carbon was transported to the deep ocean, where it will remain sequestered for centuries1 — a 'carbon sink'.

                Are you attracted by handwaving solutions? Here's one, how about nuke-glassing an entire oil-field desert and covering it by photopanels with batteries underneath, then running power cables? Each sqm produces at peak about 200W (at current efficiencies); at 2.15 million sqkm of glassed Saudi Arabia covered in solar panel will produce in one (peak) hour 0.43 TWh of energy. At an equiv of 5 peak-hours/day for an entire year, this amounts for 784TWh of energy.
                For comparison, the entire world electric energy generated from all sources in 2013 was 19,504 TWh [wikipedia.org]. Well, waddaya know? About the 40% of all electric energy for only the price of nuking a desert - yes, we need to nuke it first (use clean A-bombs) as an engineering solution for fixing that sand down and keeping the solar panels clean.
                I wonder what's not to like in this handwaving solution? (grin)

                --
                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
                • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday June 14 2018, @05:03AM (2 children)

                  Are you sure you really want solutions? Deforestation would solve the problem better than anything. Trees are by far not the most efficient plants at sequestering carbon.

                  --
                  My rights don't end where your fear begins.
                  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday June 14 2018, @05:37AM (1 child)

                    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Thursday June 14 2018, @05:37AM (#692727) Journal

                    Trees are by far not the most efficient plants at sequestering carbon.

                    Seems to me I detect a whiff of "Nirvana fallacy" here.
                    Tell you what: how about, as a proof of goodwill, one shows me the planting of a new improved efficiency species of carbon-sink vegetation on an already deforested significant area before deforesting others.

                    Maybe it's my age, but I tend to distrust solutions which promise a Nirvana replacement only after I renounced/demolished all the other good things. See?... no warranties that the Nirvana will be actually delivered, why should I take the deal?

                    Are you sure you really want solutions?

                    I'm quite sure I do not want handwaving solutions.

                    --
                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
                    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday June 16 2018, @05:10AM

                      You're spinning your own Nirvana if you think cleared land is going to be used for altruistic carbon capture rather than profitable farming. You will in fact find not nearly enough people to work one small bamboo farm for free, even if the valuable land were donated. See, farming is hard fucking work and tree huggers made their parents pay who knows how many thousands of dollars for the express purpose of them not ever having to work hard.

                      --
                      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
      • (Score: 1) by west on Wednesday June 13 2018, @02:16PM

        by west (6884) on Wednesday June 13 2018, @02:16PM (#692334)

        There are more trees now than there were in the 1700s to 1900s

  • (Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 13 2018, @12:46PM (1 child)

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Wednesday June 13 2018, @12:46PM (#692317) Journal

    You beat me to it. If people plant the right varieties of bamboo, it can be a food source too. Wonderful stuff, bamboo. You can make almost anything from it. My wife even knits with yarn made from it.

    --
    Washington DC delenda est.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:47PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 13 2018, @05:47PM (#692427)

    if space weren't a problem

    Or water.