11–20 of 153 posts
Why isn't there more focus on phytoplankton since it produces more O2? Maybe have a device that seeds/catalyzes their growth on every boat?
Yes you need to build ecosystems not just plant trees. Monoculture tree stands are often mostly empty of other life. You need to plant a variety of native species keeping track of keystone species and year round food production so that your forest supports other life.
Whenever I hear about planting trees for "carbon sequestration", I immediately remember walking through that forest and thinking how quiet and dead it felt.
"Hemp twice as effective at capturing carbon as trees, UK researcher says" (2021) https://hempindustrydaily.com/hemp-twice-as-effective-at-cap... : > “Industrial hemp absorbs between 8 to 15 tonnes of CO2 per hectare (3 to 6 tonnes per acre) of cultivation.” > Comparatively, forests capture 2 to 6 tonnes of carbon per hectare (0.8 to 2.4 tonnes per acre), depending on the region, number of years of growth, type of tr…
What you need is tonnes of carbon per hectare per year.
We don't have enough space to let these plants be there, we need to convert them into coal and throw it back into the mines.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is an area of active research but at the moment essentially all such efforts are banned by the London Protocol. The ocean is 70% of the planet’s surface and, I think, is where a lot of the work should go on.
> essentially all such efforts are banned by the London Protocol. Interesting, why? Plankton != dumping, right? Could there be contained plankton "farms" that are similar to fish farms?
As I see it, Geological CO2 storage (CCS) may be the only large-scale practical way going forward, despite all the bad rap it gets due to its historical association with the fossile fuel industry. After all, the excess C in the system came from the ground, and the ground may be the only place able to re-absorb it without significant environmental consequences.
Yes you need to build ecosystems not just plant trees. Monoculture tree stands are often mostly empty of other life. You need to plant a variety of native species keeping track of keystone species and year round food production so that your forest supports other life.
"Hemp twice as effective at capturing carbon as trees, UK researcher says" (2021) https://hempindustrydaily.com/hemp-twice-as-effective-at-cap... : > “Industrial hemp absorbs between 8 to 15 tonnes of CO2 per hectare (3 to 6 tonnes per acre) of cultivation.” > Comparatively, forests capture 2 to 6 tonnes of carbon per hectare (0.8 to 2.4 tonnes per acre), depending on the region, number of years of growth, type of tr…
tonnes of carbon per hectare is not relevant. What you need is tonnes of carbon per hectare per year. We don't have enough space to let these plants be there, we need to convert them into coal and throw it back into the mines.
Biochar is a great soil amendment, and doesn't oxidize over decades or even centuries, depending. Putting it back in the mines is an option, if we ever need to stop rebuilding topsoil, which is itself getting urgent.
Sequestring CO2 is a huge scale problem, and all solutions have significant flaws. Forests require vasts amounts of land, and storage is only assured as long as nobody decides to chop down the forest for other more pressing purposes (looking at you, Brazil). Storing CO2 in oceans (either in the form of "ocean fertilization" or by directly dissolving CO2 in seawater) could have huge and unknown consequences for marine…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
tonnes of carbon per hectare is not relevant. What you need is tonnes of carbon per hectare per year. We don't have enough space to let these plants be there, we need to convert them into coal and throw it back into the mines.
The efficient thing to do is render them into charcoal, yes. Biochar is a great soil amendment, and doesn't oxidize over decades or even centuries, depending. Putting it back in the mines is an option, if we ever need to stop rebuilding topsoil, which is itself getting urgent.