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Project Vesta – Mitigating climate change with green sand beaches

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

#251

Post by tom_mellior »

ForHackernews wrote: post #175
baron816 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s to counteract for 100% of emissions, right? A more reasonable goal would be to go for 10%. Still very ambitious, but could be done and would have a pretty huge impact. Combine that carbon pricing, technological advancements, and other sequestration schemes, and targets for avoiding environmental catastrophe seem achievable.

Sorry, can you explain why you think counteracting 10% of emissions would have "a pretty huge impact"? The best science from the IPCC suggests we have to cut net carbon emissions by 50% by 2030 in order to have a moderate chance of avoiding the most catastrophic effects of the climate disaster. I'm not saying 10% isn't ambitious, but it's entirely insufficient to the scope of the problem.

We need to eliminate actul emissions. As in, actual exhaust gases coming out of cars and planes and snokestacks, not just mathematically offset "net" emissions. There is no way around that. Then, on top of that, an additional 10% through this scheme looks pretty useful.

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

#252

Post by tom_mellior »

matznerd wrote: post #117
nine_k wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Would the olivine actually need to be (rough) sand or would pebbles or, say, fist-sized rocks work almost as well?

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

#253

Post by lenkite »

ThomPete wrote: post #240
matznerd wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do we deal with 10-12 feet of global sea level rise nearly instantaneously? There is a single glacier called in an Antarctica called Thwaites which is also known as the "cork" on an Antarctic sea that, if it melts or comes unstuck, could cause that much sea level rise that quickly. "Thwaites is like a cork in a wine bottle—when it melts, it could trigger the collapse of a large portion of West Antarctica, equal t…

"If" is the important word here. If an asteroid hit we won't be just dealing with 10-12 feet. Do you have any scientific proof that this will happen or that it's likely to happen?

Umm. Thwaites is indeed melting

https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2019/07/02/1904822116

https://www.businessinsider.in/One-of-Antarcticas-biggest-gl...

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

#255

Post by foobarbecue »

It seems these folks think km = miles. They also seem to think that "porphyritic" and "olivine" are rocks (one is an adjective and the other is a mineral).

From the FAQ: "We currently put out a significant amount of CO2 per year, so we need a volume of 7 km^3 of rock.

The equivalent amount of hydrocarbons acquired each year is currently greater than a volume of 10 km^3."

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

#256

Post by evan_ »

tempestn wrote: post #190
mc32 wrote: post #181

I skimmed through the site. I didn’t see how they convince countries to have their beeches altered. I can understand the assumption that countries would be eager to receive something which will benefit them directly, but they also know that they are serving as a “commons” as well and may want compensation for that.

If they're altering the beaches for free, the countries would enjoy a portion of the common benefit without any cost. In fact, the new 'green' (literally and figuratively) beaches would probably be a greater tourist attraction, so if anything I'd expect it to be beneficial, plus secondary economic benefits from the work being done.

It would be such a great tourist attraction that flights to visit the green sand beaches would spike dramatically... the jet exhaust offsetting the CO2 absorption.

I kid.

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

#257

Post by dentalnanobot »

Accujack wrote: post #30
groby_b wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like you didn't read the paper, or really anything on this. But, to make it easy for you: * 1 ton of Olivine will absorb 1.25 tons of CO2[1] * Transportation cost is 161.8 grams of CO2 per ton mile[2] * They are looking at mines within a 300km[1] (or ~190 miles) radius. That's a maximum transportation cost of ~31kg CO2. That's a rounding error. * Mining cost for a ton of Olivine is ~$30/ton right now. Let's…

Mines or potential mining sites for extracting Olivine on this scale don't exist within short distances of these tropical beaches. Many of the beaches are on islands which are essentially coral heads above the water. Digging down to any deposits of other rock are going to require either significant effort in terms of dewatering, caissons, and equipment or else mining underwater. This is a good idea that's probably no…

Actually I think underwater sand can absorb dissolved CO2 in water - that’s how it’s alkalising effect on oceans works. I think I remember Vesta’s docs saying there are places in the ocean (between the UK and Europe IIRC) with enough current flow that you could just put the Olivine directly on the sea-bed.

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

#258

Post by inflatableDodo »

marcusverus wrote: post #210
usrusr wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The opposite of innovation is business as usual. Taxation always leads to innovation, sometimes they are not exclusively in the field of accounting.

Do you have any support for your claim that taxation leads to innovation?

I don't know about 'leads to', I mean, innovation quite clearly precedes taxation, otherwise it would be rather difficult to invent it, but taxation definitely directly funds far more innovation than the private sector does, at least if we are talking about fundamental research.

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

#259

Post by adrianN »

goatlover wrote: post #177
lonelappde wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if the tax cripples business, it will slow emissions anyway

Also innovation.

There won't be much innovation going on in a +4° degree world. People will be busy fighting over food and water.

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

#260

Post by adrianN »

ThomPete wrote: post #224
fc_barnes wrote: post #123

Well jeez. I know it's not a popular thought on HN, but climate change is a problem of such scale that it's going to need government-level funding and oversight to find and validate geoengineering solutions, and global-level funding and coordination to implement them. This third-way aspiration to a non-government solution just seems like a pipe dream.

Can you point to a scientifically predicted and demonstrated (not just speculated) consequence of climate change we don't know how to deal with?

Hundreds of millions of refugees? Collapse of major ecosystems? Desertification? Flooding?
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