Why geoengineering, high-tech devices that “suck” carbon out of the air (nature already figured that out — plants!), and injecting carbon into or between rocks simply wrong? We can’t talk our way out of the problems we’ve behaved ourselves into, so the lesson is that nature must be respected.
Carbon Capture versus Carbon Storage
Why everyone is talking about “carbon capture”? But what about carbon sequestration and storage? Once carbon is removed or “captured” from a system, then what do you do with it? If it is embodied in the fibers of the thing you made to capture carbon, such as the case with both companies mentioned above, then you’re done. Mission accomplished! Do more of that. But if it is not embedded as part of that thing, you end up with carbon that needs a new home. Carbon Capture & Storage/Sequestration (CCS) can be controversial, depending on how the storage/sequestration is done, with two broad methods:
- Via living things, such as plants, soils, and products made from these
- Via engineering, geoengineering, chemical engineering … to pool and store carbon separately, without necessarily involving soils, plants, or biological processes.
What are the leading methods for both types, and is it safe to store it in underground geologic formations? Rocks seem pretty safe. I’ve met some rocks in my time. Solid individuals. (The jokes don’t seem to be getting any better, do they?)
Carbon in Conventional Energy and Industrial Agriculture
How do we tackle the CO2 emissions from fossil energy production and conventional/industrial food production? We quickly convert to less polluting methods, and put a tax or counterincentive on the pollution to level the playing field. We these dinosaurs out of their misery. It is a design problem we have already solved.
Accounting for the cost of carbon capture and the costs of mitigating climate change overall can help bring things into balance. CCS can reduce emissions from fossil energy production, but why do we need fossil energy at all when renewables are so abundantly available and affordable? Let’s phase them out. Leave the fossil resources in the ground or under the oceans. Can we agree that the problems at hand have taught us we need to do things differently now? Or will we wait until climate change gets that much worse before reckoning with that?
Similarly, we now have the tools and solutions in hand to make up for the yield gap in Certified Organic food production, such as via bio-available liquid phosphorous, the one fertilizer that is hardest to get, so production of pesticide-free Organic crops no longer needs to take up extra land for equivalent yields. We can feed the world without depleting soils, polluting waters with NPK runoff, without poisoning our food supply and workers.
Safety Concerns for CCS
CO2 Transport and Storage Sites Could Be Dangerous
While accident rates during the transport of CO2 are relatively low, the potential for a dangerous leak still exists. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, if CO2 were to leak from a pipeline, a concentration between 7% and 10% in the ambient air could pose an immediate threat to human life.
Leakage at the site of underground storage is also a possibility. If a sudden leak of CO2 were to happen at an injection site, it could put the health of surrounding people and animals at risk. A gradual leak from fractures in the rock layers or from injection wells has the potential to contaminate both the soil and groundwater in the area surrounding the storage site. And seismic events triggered by CO2 injection could also disrupt the areas near the storage site. All that work at such an unnatural solution can be undone with one good earthquake.
Nature has this one dialed in … if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it
Didn’t humankind get into this pickle by overlooking the long-term systemic effects of CO2 emissions into the air on a massive scale? Doesn’t our overreliance on dominating nature and thinking we know better now show us the answers must include the cautionary principle at every decision?
Consider a house made of bamboo. Not only is that bamboo the fastest-growing carbon sink known, removing carbon from the air as it grows, but then the embodied carbon ends up in a building that has a useful life of many decades. Even if the house gets “recycled” within 60 or 70 years, that carbon remains reusable and stays out of the air. Let’s envision a world where we can put carbon back to work in soils and other functions that draw it down and keep it where it can buy us time.
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