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This Lab-Made Mineral Just Became a Key Candidate For Reducing CO2 in The Atmosphere
Scientists just worked out a way of rapidly producing a mineral capable of storing carbon dioxide (CO2) - giving us a potentially exciting option for dealing with our increasingly overcooked planet. Magnesite, which is a type of magnesium carbonate, forms when magnesium combines with carbonic acid - CO2 dissolved in water. If we can produce this mineral at a massive scale, it could safely store large amounts of carbon dioxide we simply don't need in our planet's atmosphere.
[...] Being able to make the mineral in the lab could be a major step forward in terms of how effective carbon sequestration might eventually be. "Using microspheres means that we were able to speed up magnesite formation by orders of magnitude," says [Ian] Power. "This process takes place at room temperature, meaning that magnesite production is extremely energy efficient."
[...] With a tonne of naturally-occurring magnesite able to capture around half a tonne of CO2, we're going to need a lot of magnesite, and somewhere to put it all as well. As with other carbon capture processes, it's not yet clear whether this will successfully scale up as much as it needs to. That said, these new discoveries mean lab-made magnesite could one day be helpful – it puts the mineral on the table as an option for further investigation.
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(Score: 2) by fritsd on Tuesday August 21 2018, @03:37PM (1 child)
Magnesium is cheap though:
Once upon a time I was lucky to be on vacation in Bolzano (Nort hItaly).
When I woke up the next morning at dawn, those humongous pink mountains we saw to the north, were the Dolomiti.
Those are made of mostly 50-50 Calcium and Magnesium carbonate AFAIK (I don't believe they coated just the visible outside with the stuff).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 21 2018, @10:24PM
The going rate of elemental magnesium, direct from China on eBay, seems to be about 40 USD/kg. I wouldn't call that cheap; it's relatively expensive for a common metal (and one of the most abundant elements on Earth), presumably due in a large part to the high energy cost of extraction [soylentnews.org]—at 0.15 USD / kWh that'd be about 15USD/kg in extraction energy costs alone.