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Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

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Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#11

Post by chr1 »

intended wrote: post #6

I find that the idea of "climate engineers" and "geo engineering" has markers which will make it appeal to the same people currently peddling climate denial. My running bet/prediction is that 1) the imbroglio in America on climate denial will continue, 2) most of the world will feel happy that they are doing less than it should, but more than the stat 3) Eventually someone will sell the idea of !!GEO ENGINEERING!! to…

Somewhy climate engineering as a whole gets very negative responses from people who care about environment.

But the climate we had in 1800s was not particularly great either. 1/3 of the land surface was still desert, hurricanes and droughts were common too, so the strategy of reducing human population, using only clean energy, etc. won't get us to a much better place.

Of course some ideas are not great, but it doesn't mean that any attempt of improving climate via engineering is automatically bad.

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#12

Post by p0nce »

monk_e_boy wrote: post #4
myrloc wrote: post #2

I'm a fan of the Climeworks concept, but the article and the Climeworks website fail to address the obvious question: what's the net sum of CO2 collected to CO2 created in creating the energy needed to power their plants?

50 tonnes a year per machine doesn't sound much, compared to just growing bamboo or something similar.

It's still early beginnings for carbon capture. If you have money, by funding ClimeWorks and such you encourage further research on this topic.

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#14

Post by dalbasal »

These sorts of ideas are in a weird place. To many who are actively seeking better performance in our carbon reduction efforts, ideas like this could be seen as a threat to those efforts.

ATM, the debate is (1)"is the carbon-climate problem real?" and (2) "If so, how do we reduce carbon emissions?". "Climate Engineering" would complicate 2 a lot, probably splitting political support.

Politically, they open the door to continued or increased carbon emmissions today. They let us avoid addressing the "root cause." This is all regardless of timelines or progress. Just the existence of the idea in public debate might be enough to swing the opinion balance.

I imagine there are some who would ideally like to keep geoengineering as a quite Plan B so as not to disturb current efforts, but that's not really possible.

Overall, I think these ideas (if actually viable) will inevitably enter the discourse in the long term. We are already engineering in some sense. We have models and targets for both carbon and temperature. IE, we want to take control (to a small extent) of the climate. That's engineering, and engineers always look for more tools eventually.

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#15

Post by dogma1138 »

dalbasal wrote: post #14

These sorts of ideas are in a weird place. To many who are actively seeking better performance in our carbon reduction efforts, ideas like this could be seen as a threat to those efforts. ATM, the debate is (1)"is the carbon-climate problem real?" and (2) "If so, how do we reduce carbon emissions?". "Climate Engineering" would complicate 2 a lot, probably splitting political support. Politically, they open the door t…

There is no debate and no climate scientist sees this as a threat. Reduction is needed but it won't cut it its too late for natural carbon sequestering at its normal pace. People who work on reduction also often work on sequestering and if not do not see these efforts as a threat to any of their work.

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#16

Post by Reason077 »

rdl wrote: post #13

I wonder how much use CO2 extracted from the air has. Greenhouse CO2 supplementation sounds interesting but I assume there are cheaper ways to produce CO2 already.

Presumably, most of the captured CO2 eventually ends up back in the atmosphere anyway - either through leakage, or eventual decomposition of the greenhouse plants being grown.

But it's still a net gain if the CO2 would otherwise have come from fossil-derived sources?

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#17

Post by intended »

xbmcuser wrote: post #9
intended wrote: post #6

I find that the idea of "climate engineers" and "geo engineering" has markers which will make it appeal to the same people currently peddling climate denial. My running bet/prediction is that 1) the imbroglio in America on climate denial will continue, 2) most of the world will feel happy that they are doing less than it should, but more than the stat 3) Eventually someone will sell the idea of !!GEO ENGINEERING!! to…

In the last few months I have read a few articles on hackernews about converting carbon dioxide into usable fuel. My hope for the future is that we come up with a way to capture and convert carbon dioxide even if doing so requires electricity as this would make renewables cheaper and stop more carbon output.

So be forewarned - spending more energy to clean the system is just adding more heat to the system.

Any solution must somehow be a net negative in the long and medium term - and must also not have complex unpredictable knock on effects.

To give you an idea of how often mankind tries this - before the internet there was a time where london's dogs were so Onerous they felt that it would be a good idea to pour oil over the water.

Hindsight is of course 20/20, my point being that healthy scepticism and a high bar for evidence are the watchwords.

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#18

Post by Tade0 »

ghshephard wrote: post #10
monk_e_boy wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

50 tonnes a year per machine doesn't sound much, compared to just growing bamboo or something similar.

"Each year, a hectare of Moso bamboo absorbs 5.1 tons of carbon" http://inesad.edu.bo/developmentroast/2013/05/what-can-bambo... You would need 10 Hectares of land to equal one of these machine. Sounds reasonably impressive to me. Even more impressive if the climework "tonne" is 2200 pounds and the bamboo ton is just 1000 pounds.

There goes my genius idea to grow bamboo and turn it into charcoal to trap carbon.

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#19

Post by intended »

shoo wrote: post #7
intended wrote: post #6

I find that the idea of "climate engineers" and "geo engineering" has markers which will make it appeal to the same people currently peddling climate denial. My running bet/prediction is that 1) the imbroglio in America on climate denial will continue, 2) most of the world will feel happy that they are doing less than it should, but more than the stat 3) Eventually someone will sell the idea of !!GEO ENGINEERING!! to…

to add to your optimism: * geoengineering avoids fixing the root problem by patching some (but not all) of the symptoms, and probably creating new symptoms * the effects of climate change are not uniform over the globe, so for any application of geoengineering there will be winners and losers * much research hasn't been done to figure out if the various geoengineering proposals are safe, and there is no test environm…

Here's another one - eventually and soon, there will be a generation who know no other climate And weather than what we leave them with.

Extreme weather will just be part of the cost of doing business.

In that light, I suppose eventually businesses will want someone to reduce that risk, and will farm the contract out to the most cost effective Option.

BTW the idea I most prefer when it comes to geo engineering - flotillas of little robots spraying water at the poles in order to help create more snow and ice.

Re: Climate Engineers Sucking Carbon Dioxide from the Atmosphere

#20

Post by legulere »

> Working around the clock, each capture plant can vacuum about 50 tons of CO₂ from the atmosphere a year, Wurzbacher says.

For a comparison the per capita CO₂ emissions per capita in the US are 20 tons. With an average household size of 2.58 you would need one of those plants + CO₂ storage facilities per household.

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