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U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

reuters.com

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Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#321

Post by Emma_Goldman »

inglor_cz wrote: post #313
Factorium wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as you add that requirement to coal power plants, they become immediately uneconomic to build or operate. They are already borderline due to the fall in cost of renewables. With a meagre Carbon Tax of $15/tonne, coal costs double in the US. There's nothing that can be done to fix coal power apart from just shutting it all down.

The EU has much higher pricing of CO2 (currently at 60 eur / tonne [0]) and yet Germany was using more coal power than expected, forced by the fact that there was a scarcity of wind. [1] Of course, that caused the prices of electricity for households to jump up. [2] [0] https://www.euractiv.com/section/emissions-trading-scheme/ne... [1] https://www.dw.com/en/germany-coal-tops-wind-as-primary-elec... [2] https://www.d…

Carbon Tracker calculates that the majority of coal plants in Europe are already cost negative.[1] They live off uncompetitive tariffs and subsidies. Germany's reverse auction for coal plants over the last year ended up accepting a lot of very low bids, as coal owners were desperate to get out from under stranded assets. Even they were widely criticized as over-priced given the state of the industry.

[1] https://carbontracker.org/cop26-a-chance-to-reset-and-elimin...

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#322

Post by andrewjl »

MaxGanzII wrote: post #232
rcxdude wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on current trajectories, the world's population is not going to double again (or even increase by 50%), it will level off at about 10 billion and at that point perhaps start to shrink. It's possible this level is not sustainable with an acceptable standard of living, but it's not obvious and it certainly isn't inevitable that humanity will reproduce out of control.

I would say though that this is what I'm arguing. The planet can't cope now - the environment is falling apart right now, already - and the mid-range estimate there's another two or three billion people to come over the next few decades. There are estimates in excess of this, there are estimates lower. Estimates which have population declines see slow declines only. I've not seen any real understanding of why the fer…

Can you provide a source for the mid-range estimate you mention? Global population is on the brink of decline rather than further growth. [1]

> I've not seen any real understanding of why the fertility rate is dropping, particularly in first world countries. That's a concern; what happens if the factors causing this to happen are transient?

The cited article discusses several potential causes and none are going away in the near future. On a global basis, humanity's current demographic profile locks in decades of either very low growth or a decline in most regions. Worth noting that these changes have all come about at a much faster pace than even the most aggressive estimates.

Despite this as our overall numbers will start shrinking, resource consumption will grow and its growth can't be prevented by force without conflict. The only class of realistic solutions to environmental degradation are technological ones. Tapping into new stockpiles (likely out in space) and increasing efficiency slash decreasing resource intensity of economic activity are more viable if one aims to avoid armed confrontation.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/22/world/global-population-s...

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#323

Post by Emma_Goldman »

aunty_helen wrote: post #18
jandrese wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More importantly, having an actual price tag on removing carbon from the atmosphere would allow carbon markets to finally work. Assuming there is enough political will to properly monitor and tax CO2 emissions worldwide, which is a huge ask. A lot of companies and countries will be tempted to lie because it will make their products more competitive.

Cant we see this from space? Estimate the amount of co2 coming from each country that way and send them a bill every year. My first thought was “that’s where auditing and bureaucracy come in” but maybe satellites are a better way

CO2 no, but spatial imaging is already being used to help create systematic databases of fossil fuel assets.

See: https://www.cgfi.ac.uk/spatial-finance-initiative/

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#324

Post by robbedpeter »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #51
dane-pgp wrote: post #2

> The Department of Energy's Carbon Negative Earthshot seeks to slash the cost of carbon removal to $100 a tonne by the end of the decade At 40 gigatonnes a year, that would be $4 trillion, which is about 5% of Gross World Product.[0] It's probably still cheaper to avoid emitting the CO2 in the first place, but that does put an upper bound on the cost of reaching net zero. Of course, no one wants to take a voluntary…

> It's probably still cheaper to avoid emitting the CO2 in the first place, but that does put an upper bound on the cost of reaching net zero. It seems hard to believe that removing CO2 from the atmosphere could ever be less expensive than not emitting it to begin with. You're working against thermodynamics. So the whole thing seems like a fraud. An excuse to keep emitting CO2 while claiming that you'll do something…

At a superficial level of analysis, yes, but you can't turn off all the coal plants, stop oil extraction, convert ice to electric, and distribute sufficient power storage to keep modern life going at a snap of the fingers. If you can offset the emissions while at the same time moving toward renewable and sustainable energy, you're mitigating necessary inefficiencies.

Mitigation is better than fantasizing about rapid fossil fuel elimination. There are way too many lives that depend on maintaining the status quo, in terms of power and economics and chemical resources. Progress will be gradual, like cleanup of the pacific garbage patch.

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#325

Post by robbedpeter »

chillwaves wrote: post #155
Factorium wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as you add that requirement to coal power plants, they become immediately uneconomic to build or operate. They are already borderline due to the fall in cost of renewables. With a meagre Carbon Tax of $15/tonne, coal costs double in the US. There's nothing that can be done to fix coal power apart from just shutting it all down.

Isn't that the whole appeal of our economic system? To root out these inefficiencies? If it is not economically feasible to run a coal plant if they do not externalize the pollution cost, how is that my problem? And if the demand justifies it, the cost for coal-generated electricity will go up. It's a matter of priorities and resource allocation. Why do we allow coal operators to enrich themselves at the cost of ever…

The negative externalities are too many degrees of separation and to many years away from any immediately obvious perception of harm.

"Officer, these men are stealing my lawn, a few blades of grass a day as they walk by!" This doesn't engender a threat response until there's visible damage, and even then the solution is likely to involve signs and warnings, since the responsibility for total damage is so widely distributed. We need a fence around the climate lawn, and we can't leave the gate open for some people and not others, if you catch my drift.

We're beginning to see global acknowledgment of the problems and gradual progress towards reducing emissions. Once technology can accurately measure the cost of the negative externalities, they can be priced in. If the cost is on an exponential trend, where each ton of co2 is now seen to cost the operator an additional .0000001 cents, but 100 years later might cost millions, with regards to preventable damage, markets currently are accurately pricing in the costs. They're just not equipped to assess global climate and long term planning as relevant. That has to come from legislating sane and scientific and fair rules.

There's nothing inherently wrong with burning coal if there's a globally recognized system of accountability. Since there's not likely to ever be such a hegemony, you get what we have now - slow, frustratingly bureaucratic incremental progress, and therefore the need for mitigation as well as sustainable energy tech.

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#326

Post by andy_ppp »

missedthecue wrote: post #269
andy_ppp wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The marine fuel used to transport 60%+ more stuff, it increases the carbon cost in a way that’s hugely inefficient. I worked on a project for an unnamed Australian mining company trying to optimise the shipping routes and I just see this sort of thing as profoundly wasteful.

But my point is that you aren't necessarily reducing the amount of fuel used. Either you ship coal, and make steel there, or you keep the coal here and ship the finished steel off. Either way, the metal has to get to China.

Iron ore is about 60% iron and the stats I’m seeing suggest 1 tonne of steel takes about 0.77 tonnes of coal. So you need fewer than half the amount of heavily polluting ships if the steel was made in Australia.

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#327

Post by incrudible »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #288
incrudible wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Watts cost dollars. It's not that simple. For instance, when there's too much electricity on the European grid because, say, wind energy is particularly strong that day in Germany, producers need to pay for someone else to take that electricity. It has negative cost. This is rare for now, but it does limit the rollout of renewables. I thought the example of solar energy in the Sahara was rather convincing? It's a l…

> It's not that simple. For instance, when there's too much electricity on the European grid because, say, wind energy is particularly strong that day in Germany, producers need to pay for someone else to take that electricity. It has negative cost. This is rare for now, but it does limit the rollout of renewables. If you don't have any external pressure or subsidies on you, you can turn off solar/wind in seconds. Re…

Those "slow to ramp" plants are necessary to provide the base load. The cause of the overload is the volatility of renewables. Whether it would be cheaper to curtail renewables and who exactly gets to foot the bill - I don't know. Doesn't seem reasonable to me that, say, France should pay Germany because their very stable nuclear plants can't accommodate for the volatility of renewables elsewhere. Either way, the cost is negative, or at least zero if you turn it off. It's worthless energy, going to waste.

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#328

Post by patrickk »

Robotbeat wrote: post #273
guiriduro wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there are applications like long-haul jets and cement production where eliminating emissions isn't that easy. I disagree, there's an easy solution to eliminating those emissions: have zero long-haul jets and zero cement production. Before this gets (inevitably) downvoted, the more interesting question is why do we need either, what alternatives are there, how fundamentally we're willing to question our biases and e…

I would say it's pretty dang tough to not have cement. What do you use for a house foundation? Many apartments are made of cement and essentially every building uses a cement foundation. Luckily, cement is not a big part of the total emissions. Neither is long haul travel, particularly. Short haul flights are about half of all passenger-miles in air travel, can be made fully electric, and long-haul and medium haul fl…

> and long-haul and medium haul flights can be split up into multiple legs for almost every route.

A better solution would be to eventually ban/tax out of existence regular jet fuel, and move to synthetically-produced jet fuel[1] which can be used in today's jet engines, but is carbon neutral. Perhaps eventually all fuels can be 100% synthetic when new jets are designed for it.

[1] https://www.dw.com/en/sustainable-aviation-fuel-power-to-liq...

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#329

Post by blue1 »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #65
blue1 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

from wikipedia: "All the CO2 that is produced by burning one liter of oil can be sequestered by less than one liter of olivine." Doesn't that require a monstrous amount of olivine to obtain significant effects?

We burn monstrous amount of oil, Conservation of mass. A liter of oil produces 3 kilos of CO2, density of rocks is 3-4 kilos per liter.

Imagine. For each tanker truck that goes to a gas pump, you need to carry away a truck of the same size full of rocks.

Rather nice image for the idea of "not sustainable".

Re: U.S. sets goal to drive down cost of removing CO2 from atmosphere

#330

Post by pharke »

GekkePrutser wrote: post #305
DennisP wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, which is why mostly the idea is to just bury the CO2. However, if you do want to make fuel from it, say for airliners, then it's totally possible, you just have to add hydrogen, and more energy than you'll get from burning the fuel. E.g. the Sabatier process to make methane.

But if you already have loads of hydrogen to play with you might as well just burn that, right?

Carbon is the ideal hydrogen storage system. It raises the critical point by 160K and increase the density achievable at normal temperatures and pressures drastically. Don't discount the energy that needs to go in to pressurizing and cooling hydrogen, it results in significant CO2 production. I'd be very interested in seeing a comparison of the energy requirements for methane production vs. hydrogen storage, I have a feeling that it would favour methane if you accounted for all of the variables.
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