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Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

projectvesta.org

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Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#111

Post by shawnb576 »

supergauntlet wrote: post #86
loons2 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Greenhouse owners generally spike their air to 1200-1500ppm CO2. That's the compromise between best cost and best for the plants and is lower than these species evolved in. As to humans, 400ppm causes zero problems, matter of fact, OSHA says 1000ppm for continuous exposure. NIOSH says 10,000 ppm for a 10 hour work shift. For instance: https://inspectapedia.com/hazmat/Carbon%20_Dioxide_Exposure_...

The GP obviously doesn't mean that 1000+ ppm CO2 is toxic, they mean that the changes to the environment it would cause are less than ideal for humans to thrive.

1000ppm decreases human cognitive ability by ~20%. It's hard enough to deal with these problems with the brainpower we have.

[1] https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/10.1289/ehp.1510037

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#112

Post by oh_sigh »

nostromo wrote: post #109

I have this invention that runs on solar power and water, removes carbon from the atmosphere day and night, lowers the nearby temperature of the Earth dramatically, is bio-degradable, and best of all, it self replicates. I'm calling it Tree and I'll sell you it for $0.

Only problem is you would need 300+ million acres of new forest to offset human activity. 300 million acres is larger than Texas and California combined.

And then you need to deal with mature trees which aren't sequestering CO2 at any appreciable rate.

http://urbanforestrynetwork.org/benefits/air%20quality.htm

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#113

Post by kragen »

crazydoggers wrote: post #69
matznerd wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We will be testing the sources of olivine for nickel, and as posted upstream, we have potential solutions for phytomining the olivine reserves for nickel with nickel hyper-accumulating plants, and then burning plants, retrieving the nickel ore and using the proceeds it to further fund operations...

I hope you would still run tests to determine how much left over Nickel is getting into the ocean. Not just coral will be effected by Nickel, but other important invertebrates as well such as amphipods which play an enormous role in the food chain and health of reef environments. And we’re talking parts per billion (ppb) when heavy metals can start to become toxic. And correct me if I’m wrong, but Manganese is anothe…

The dose makes the poison, and in the case of manganese (which is, by the way, not a proper noun), the toxic dose is quite large (unless you're inhaling it), to the point where manganese deficiency is a larger public health problem in humans than manganese poisoning. MnO2 and even the soluble manganese sulfate we use for fertilizer are in the same blue-1 classification as things like alcohol and potassium chloride.

Nickel is a more reasonable concern; nickel sulfate's lethal dose is on the order of 250 mg/kg for humans, so around 10 or 15 grams for an adult. It's not really in the same category as things like mercury, lead, thallium, barium, or even cadmium.

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#114

Post by loons2 »

oh_sigh wrote: post #112
nostromo wrote: post #109

I have this invention that runs on solar power and water, removes carbon from the atmosphere day and night, lowers the nearby temperature of the Earth dramatically, is bio-degradable, and best of all, it self replicates. I'm calling it Tree and I'll sell you it for $0.

Only problem is you would need 300+ million acres of new forest to offset human activity. 300 million acres is larger than Texas and California combined. And then you need to deal with mature trees which aren't sequestering CO2 at any appreciable rate. http://urbanforestrynetwork.org/benefits/air%20quality.htm

Planting a trillion trees could be our best strategy to tackle climate change. Can we do it?

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/planting-trillion-tree...

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#115

Post by HunOL »

nostromo wrote: post #109

I have this invention that runs on solar power and water, removes carbon from the atmosphere day and night, lowers the nearby temperature of the Earth dramatically, is bio-degradable, and best of all, it self replicates. I'm calling it Tree and I'll sell you it for $0.

Can I buy from you 100k trees for $0?

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#116

Post by SwellJoe »

6d6b73 wrote: post #94
SwellJoe wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are decades into pumping vastly more carbon into the atmosphere than is sustainable. We're not going to accidentally flip that problem upside down without noticing years in advance.

Like we've reacted when scientists told us about rising co2 levels 30 or 40 years ago?

I don't think I understand your position here. Do you believe there is a profit motive to doing this kind of carbon sequestration? As I understand it, it's going to be expensive to do, and require significant money/time/effort to keep doing it. So, what will keep it going in your runaway scenario? Why will people keep mining and moving these materials into place beyond the point where it is necessary to counter our current crisis?

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#117

Post by matznerd »

nine_k wrote: post #41
matznerd wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, co-founder of Project Vesta here. Based on a CO2 life cycle assessment, to minimize CO2 created during transport, the idea is to utilize mines within 300 km (186 mi) of the destination beach. Including mining, milling, and transport, we can hopefully maintain only a 4% efficiency loss in terms of CO2.[1] This paper has a few examples of models where it is 93% efficient for mines within 1,000 km. [2] Fortunately,…

Will olivine-covered beaches be still good for recreation? Will olivine sand produce fine dust that would muddy the water? I bet the first few green beaches would just look cool enough to increase he stream of tourists — as long as walking over an olivine beach feels safe and not unpleasant. Also, is dumping olivine on rocky but flat enough shores an option? That is, may it not replace existing sandy beaches but form…

Hi, yes the beaches would still be good for recreation and there should not be a noticeable muddying of the water. The existing beaches of olivine (such as Papakolea Beach in Hawaii that is pictured on our website) are safe and have no observed negative effects on wildlife or humans.

If you look at the tabletop shaker experiments on the website, the water is cloudy because it is not being refreshed. In an open-system such as on a beach with water constantly refreshing, that would not be an issue.

The olivine can be placed on any shoreline or coastal area. The "tropical shelf-sea beach" set up we constantly refer to is simply the optimal and preferential solution. The main effects we are utilizing the beach for are that (1) the tumbling motion of the waves causes a constant abrasion that breaks up a silica coating that rapidly forms on exposed olivine and (2) the collision of grains on the shoreline causes smaller slivers to chip off, that themselves rapidly weather.

We want shelf-seas because the grains will be pulled off the beach and will continue to be weathered through underwater shear stress forces on the sea bed. Other locations work as well, but the olivine may take longer to weather if there is less motion, colder water, etc.

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#118

Post by dllthomas »

mveety wrote: post #66

This is cool. I’ve thought about carbon sequestration a lot using big nuke plants/solar plants+air liquidification+some plant to distill off and turn the CO2 into like methane or some hydrocarbon. My thought here was put half back in the ground and sell the other half to fund the installation/make sure we don’t run out of hydrocarbons. The olivine process, though, is probably easier because it takes much less infrast…

I'd say this project also has their heads in the sand.

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#119

Post by kragen »

nine_k wrote: post #41
matznerd wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, co-founder of Project Vesta here. Based on a CO2 life cycle assessment, to minimize CO2 created during transport, the idea is to utilize mines within 300 km (186 mi) of the destination beach. Including mining, milling, and transport, we can hopefully maintain only a 4% efficiency loss in terms of CO2.[1] This paper has a few examples of models where it is 93% efficient for mines within 1,000 km. [2] Fortunately,…

Will olivine-covered beaches be still good for recreation? Will olivine sand produce fine dust that would muddy the water? I bet the first few green beaches would just look cool enough to increase he stream of tourists — as long as walking over an olivine beach feels safe and not unpleasant. Also, is dumping olivine on rocky but flat enough shores an option? That is, may it not replace existing sandy beaches but form…

How the beach feels mostly depends on the particle size; magnetite sand, quartz sand, and obsidian sand feel about the same. (At some extreme, that would presumably break down; I wouldn't want to walk on a beach made of shredded fiberglass, at least until it had gone through some physical weathering. And sawdust does feel different. But olivine is not such an extreme case.)

Re: Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

#120

Post by 4ntonius8lock »

matznerd wrote: post #73
asauce wrote: post #37

Hey, heads up to anyone associated with Project Vesta... currently your webshop shows an empty store[0]. Also, if executed right then this project could market itself. Travel "influencers" love to show off unique beaches and destinations, and uniquely coloured beaches are always a huge hit. By marketing these beaches appropriately it will generate a lot of attention and (hopefully) a lot of funding for the project. G…

Hi, if you'd like to donate at this point please check out https://projectvesta.org/donate where we currently have our "Grain of Hope" necklace available. It is a single grain of olivine, suspended in a sand timer vial, to symbolize that although time is ticking, it is not too late to stop (and reverse) the damage. Since we do not have a beach yet where we can place olivine, we were originally not planning to offer t…

May I suggest selling a pound of olivine?

I can see people dumping it individually at the beach for instagram pictures.

I know it wouldn't be effective, but the idea is to raise money while giving people a feeling of participation.

That's the reason those silly 'ocean plastic' recycled 'jewelry' sell so well.

You'd also introduce it as 'normal' before having to deal with bureaucrats.

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