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The quest to trap carbon in stone

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Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#61

Post by DennisP »

brightstep wrote: post #34
DennisP wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how it's delusional to look for a technological solution to a problem that was caused by technology in the first place. In any case, at this point even if we stopped emissions tomorrow we'd still need negative emissions to get back to a safe level.

The problem with the search for technological salvation is that it allows us to avoid talking about the fact that regardless, we do need to leave fossil fuels in the ground starting yesterday .

But we can't start yesterday, and leaving them in the ground starting today is too late. So we really have no choice but to figure out how to take carbon back out of the atmosphere.

Besides, technology can help us leave fossil fuels in the ground. It's not like all those solar panels and batteries aren't advanced technology.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#62

Post by sdenton4 »

Nabati wrote: post #32
GunnarSturla wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we trap it in biomass, it will escape if anything happens to the ecosystem storing the carbon (like a forest fire). The fundamental problem is that the earth was in a balance, with regards to carbon; a bunch was trapped in biomass, and cycled through the carbon cycle [1]. Then humanity did two things; we destroyed a lot of carbon stores (with agriculture, deforestation and setting off soil erosion), and (more impo…

"The fundamental problem is that the earth was in a balance," Nit pick but, is there anything that says the earth isn't or won't be at a balance? Sure, climate change will be hugely impactful, especially for humans, but I figure the earth will still be in balance, just not the one we are used to.

Venus and Mars both found their own kinds of balance. As far as we can tell, balances that favor life are rare.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#63

Post by betwixthewires »

sdenton4 wrote: post #62
Nabati wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The fundamental problem is that the earth was in a balance," Nit pick but, is there anything that says the earth isn't or won't be at a balance? Sure, climate change will be hugely impactful, especially for humans, but I figure the earth will still be in balance, just not the one we are used to.

Venus and Mars both found their own kinds of balance. As far as we can tell, balances that favor life are rare.

I'm not arguing the point you're arguing against, but I felt the need to point out that those two extremes are not what we are talking about, we are talking about a new "balance" that is known to have supported life in the past.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#64

Post by nickff »

pacifist wrote: post #58
nickff wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think the technological solution is less likely to succeed than your 'reduction and degrowth' political solution? Do you have any examples of a successful political solution like the one you describe?

Do you have any examples of a successful technological solution? We've never been here before so there are no examples in either category. It's clear that we need massive changes in behavior to stop dumping CO2 and other more potent greenhouse gases, such as methane, into the atmosphere(stop driving, don't fly, and, I'm sorry, no more babies). At 8 billion and counting, we've outstripped the planet's ability to susta…

Well, Malthus' dismal predictions of starvation were averted through improvements in agricultural productivity. I would say this is a success of technology.

With respect to failures of politics, I would suggest you look to nuclear proliferation. All political solutions to this have been miserable failures.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#65

Post by renewiltord »

MauranKilom wrote: post #43
gtsop wrote: post #25

When I was a kid my teacher told me trees convert co2 to oxygen. If I had to suck co2 out of the atmosphere I would plant more trees and stop choping/burning down existing ones. It is cheap, sustainable and aesthetically pleasing, but I guess this isn't tecky enough for today's world. Maybe if we add a wifi module on trees it would fix it.

Trees do that, but what happens when they die? Planting trees to fix CO2 emissions is like fixing the leak in your roof by putting more buckets below. Sure, it helps a bit, but it only buffers the water - you still need to dump it. Similarly, we need to get carbon out of the cycle. For reference, some googled numbers: - The amazon rainforest holds about 123 billion tons of carbon in total . - For the past decade, we'…

If we just build houses out of the trees we can keep the carbon out for a long time.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#66

Post by thaumasiotes »

eikenberry wrote: post #7
kornhole wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We hackers like to believe there is a technological solution for everything. These projects feed that delusion. Massive reductions and degrowth are hard for us to accept. This article somewhat fairly explains how extremely impractical and unlikely carbon capture technologies will be. The investments in the technology and the PR around them serve more to feed the delusion and keep us burning as usual.

I think you can forgive people for wanting to look for solutions that don't require millions/billions of deaths, as that's the only way you'll see the level of change necessary. It will happen naturally over time as economic levels rise and reproduction rates drop below sustaining. But that will take centuries and lots of resources, so I'm doubtful that is what you are proposing.

> It will happen naturally over time as economic levels rise and reproduction rates drop below sustaining. But that will take centuries

The theory of evolution tells us that over centuries, reproduction rates will not drop.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#67

Post by kornhole »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #53
kornhole wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We hackers like to believe there is a technological solution for everything. These projects feed that delusion. Massive reductions and degrowth are hard for us to accept. This article somewhat fairly explains how extremely impractical and unlikely carbon capture technologies will be. The investments in the technology and the PR around them serve more to feed the delusion and keep us burning as usual.

> We hackers like to believe there is a technological solution for everything. These projects feed that delusion. Massive reductions and degrowth are hard for us to accept. Massive reductions and degrowth are not going to happen in a democracy. People can say they are all for fighting climate change, but the minute the price of gasoline goes up, they are ready to vote out the leaders. Look at the US where Biden's app…

I think you are onto something. Our(US) government and ideologies are on a crash course with reality. The question is which side is more immovable.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#68

Post by kornhole »

lovecg wrote: post #49
brightstep wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution you describe has already been found: stop burning and leave fossil fuels in the ground. Technological solutions are the opposite. They're an attempt to avoid the what everyone already knows is the answer.

There are millions of people who are not in poverty right now because these fuels are being used. What you’re suggesting will immediately put them back into poverty. A lot of them will probably die of starvation and disease. I don’t think they’ll go down without a fight.

I can't cite the statistic I read, but it seems very plausible that the wealthiest ten percent of the world's population contribute about fifty percent of the world's pollution. They are going to put up a bigger fight. It doesn't have to be a major fight though. Social pressure can go a long way.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#69

Post by MauranKilom »

renewiltord wrote: post #65
MauranKilom wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trees do that, but what happens when they die? Planting trees to fix CO2 emissions is like fixing the leak in your roof by putting more buckets below. Sure, it helps a bit, but it only buffers the water - you still need to dump it. Similarly, we need to get carbon out of the cycle. For reference, some googled numbers: - The amazon rainforest holds about 123 billion tons of carbon in total . - For the past decade, we'…

If we just build houses out of the trees we can keep the carbon out for a long time.

That is an approach. Note though that, again, the total number of houses at any given moment is not going to exceed a certain number, and when we replace houses, we more or less set free the carbon in the previous one. So once again, this is more like a bucket than a drain.

Re: The quest to trap carbon in stone

#70

Post by gtsop »

downWidOutaFite wrote: post #42
gtsop wrote: post #25

When I was a kid my teacher told me trees convert co2 to oxygen. If I had to suck co2 out of the atmosphere I would plant more trees and stop choping/burning down existing ones. It is cheap, sustainable and aesthetically pleasing, but I guess this isn't tecky enough for today's world. Maybe if we add a wifi module on trees it would fix it.

From a kid's level of understanding you could also deduce that the carbon must end up in the plant matter, and that a forest's plant matter density doesn't increase forever. Old forests reach a carbon-neutral equilibrium (decaying plants release carbon). New forests suck up carbon until they reach that equilibrium. Another idea you could deduce from this is that if we remove plant matter from the forest, and lock tha…

I think more information is needed as input here. In pwrticular, what is the ratio of consumed/stored co2 in the photosynthesis process. My super basic understanding is that co2 is being used as fuel to convert energy into tree-food. By that logic i would expect at least a portion of the co2 to be actually transformed to other elements rather than stored as-is into the tree.
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