From the Princeton news website
Technologies for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere are unlikely to offer an economically feasible way to slow human-driven climate change for several decades, according to a report issued by the American Physical Society and led by Princeton engineer Robert Socolow.
“We humans should not kid ourselves that we can pour all the carbon dioxide we wish into the atmosphere right now and pull it out later at little cost,” said Socolow, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering.
The report, issued by a committee of 13 experts, was co-chaired by Socolow and Michael Desmond, a chemist at BP. The group looked at technologies known as “Direct Air Capture,” or DAC, which would involve using chemicals to absorb carbon dioxide from the open air, concentrating the carbon dioxide, and then storing it safely underground.
[The full report is available from the American Physical Society.]
In essence, the committee found that such a strategy would be far more expensive than simply preventing the emission of the carbon dioxide in the first place.Making optimistic assumptions about initial DAC technologies, the committee concluded that, from the evidence it had seen, building and operating a system would cost at least $600 per metric ton of carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere, for a system that could work today. Building a system big enough to compensate for the emissions of a 1,000-megawatt coal power plant would require 30 kilometers of equipment. In comparison, removing carbon dioxide from the flue gas of a coal-fired power plant would cost about $80 per ton.
As a result, the group concluded, DAC is not likely to become worthwhile until nearly all the significant point sources of carbon dioxide are eliminated.
“We ought to be developing plans to bring to an end the carbon dioxide emissions at every coal and natural gas power plant on the planet,” Socolow said. Beyond using electricity more efficiently, options are to modify plants so their emissions are kept from the atmosphere or to shut them down entirely and replace them with low-carbon alternatives, he said.
“We don’t have to do this job overnight. But the technologies we studied in this report, capable of removing carbon dioxide from the air, are not a substitute for addressing power plants directly,” Socolow added.
The possibility of using DAC has arisen in policy discussions that contemplate a so-called “overshoot” strategy in which the target level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is exceeded and then reduced later through use of some air capture technology.
In its report, the group noted that, “No demonstration or pilot-scale DAC system has yet been deployed anywhere on earth, and it is entirely possible that no DAC concept under discussion today or yet to be invented will actually succeed in practice. Nonetheless, DAC has entered policy discussions and deserves close analysis.”
Socolow noted that while the contents of the report serve as a warning against complacency, the experience of developing the report offers grounds for optimism. “The message of hope is that smart scientists and engineers are getting more and more interested in energy and climate problems,” Socolow said.
“The committee that worked on this problem included both senior researchers and researchers starting their careers, and both industry experts and academics,” he continued. “The review process elicited contributions from thirty to forty others. Everyone was a volunteer. Leading this project convinced me that scientists and engineers are poised to provide many creative strategies to reduce the risks of dangerous climate change.”
The DAC assessment began when it was authorized by the American Physical Society’s Panel of Public Affairs in 2008. Socolow’s first co-chair was William Brinkman, who was then a senior research physicist at Princeton and now directs the Office of Science at the Department of Energy. They convened a meeting of experts at Princeton in March 2009, but then Brinkman’s move to Washington required him to step down from the group. Socolow continued the project, first with co-chair Arun Majumdar, who stepped down to direct the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy initiative, then with Desmond.
Socolow co-directs Princeton’s Carbon Mitigation Initiative, leads the Siebel Energy Grand Challenge, and is an associated faculty member of the Princeton Environmental Institute and the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment.
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The APS report is here: Direct Air Capture of CO2 with Chemicals Report (2.4 MB) 
The “deserves close analysis” is fair comment; I believe he meant that because it has entered policy analysis it has to be squelched ASAP. The rest of the pro-cAGW bumpf is possibly just there to get him past the censors.
crosspatch says:
May 9, 2011 at 4:42 pm
I can do you one better.
Go shopping.
Make as many small purchases as possible. Buy as many small items as possible and insist on a paper bag. (In my state, the “State Stores” conveniently place their 750 mL products in paper bags.) Then…throw out the bag in the trash Hopefully, you live in a modern community that buries its trash in an efficient modern landfill.
Presto…Sequestration! (Even has benefits with plastic bags, since this would at least make you “carbon neutral”).
After considerable Deep Thought, I’ve decided that we don’t need to worry about starving the flora, or even worry that our (much-appreciated) contributions will abate. The Real World, aka China and India, will ensure that CO2 continues to rise just fine, thankyewverrahmuch.
But considerable self-injury by interference with energy production and use in the West is not just likely, it’s already wired-in. The UK will be the 800-lb canary in the mine with its hyper-inane wind-turbinization. If turbanization doesn’t get it first.
That $80/ton cost estimate for removing CO2 from flue gas is interesting. I wonder what it would balloon to if the opportunity cost of withholding that gas from productive agricultural recycling were included. Plus the opportunity cost of not having the millions or billions of $80s available to actually do something useful.
Bastiat’s “unseen” has a fierce butt-bite.
What’s the big deal about CO2 anyways?
Either geologic forces will lock it all up permanently in rock, or a big asteroid will come along and vaporize the CO2 out of the crust.
In the meantime, the biosphere will do with the extra CO2 what the biosphere will do.
Scrooges out there just want all the fuels for themselves, and Grinches don’t want anyone to have any.
Naturally, their goofy plan will never work (this time). I guess I’m in a dark mood after this story, trying to find some humor (below) in it. If they keep messing with the planet, they might find a way to really screw things up.
Nevertheless, let’s try a wild Sci-Fi story:
They wanted to fix global warming, so they built a machine that worked twice as well as predicted. CO2 fell to 150 ppmv and all of our crops died. The oceans survived because of alkalinity. Nothing left on land but crabgrass. Yikes!
People knew they were going to starve. The elites tried to jam into old bomb shelters with all the MREs they could find. Ordinary people in the major cities started shooting each other, fighting over the remainnig food, and eventually eating each other. Many ventured out of the cities, but couldn’t get far since the gas stations stopped working when electricity failed.
After the cities burned, CO2 levels were partially restored. Farmers in areas farther away from the major cities were able to plant new crops. In the end the red states retained the majority of their population.
Epilogue: The global warming problem never returned.
What title would you like?
A) We’re Room Temperature Now
B) Just Deserts
C) Gone with the Wind (oops, that’s taken)
D) Please don’t eat the zombie daisies
E) 28 States Later
I can think of two methods off the top of my head. No idea how viable they are though.
1. Run the exhaust air from a power station through green houses. What is usable by plants will be used, and you get a good return on your investment to boot.
2. Bubble the exhaust through water. This could be a sewerage effluent plant, fresh water with algae, or salt water with algae. I believe the salt water algae version is used in animal food pellets and fertiliser.
Note to Princeton: Plants
Note to Parents: Send your kids to a better school.
Note to Socolow: Why would we want to limit or reduce emissions? No sick fantasies now but, please list one negative thing associated with any reasonably believable carbon dioxide increase that is likely to occur? Embarassingly stupid.
do they have any clue how small 100 ppm really is…………
Problem solved, patent applied for. I’ll let you know.
So, now we know that there is not any real science expertise at Princeton. Where next?
I discount the IQ of anyone who thinks that a trace gas can drive climate or that the IPCC is a scientific body by 20 points. Another 20 points, if they smoke.
doctordrewl says:
May 9, 2011 at 3:03 pm
“……. My guess is that if the folks at BP wanted to make this technology viable… they would…….”
Yeah the folks at BP can do anything.
Did they ever stop to think that trees remove CO2 from the air? Once you go to Princeton you stop knowing that? I mean really.
I was going to say something, and then I see everyone else beat me to it!
My Dad’s getting ready to plant 28 Acres’ of DAC providing Corn, just as soon as all this CAGW produced Cold and Rain let up. /sarc
Unbelievable. And Princeton still calls itself a university. It’s time its registration was cancelled.
How about allowing the dead to sell their vaults for carbon storage? I’m just a little elf so will have plenty of room in my coffin. So I’m selling coffin space at a premium price. I’ll even allow advertising on my gravestone. This is just too easy. Stupid people will buy just about anything.
“Technologies for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere are unlikely to offer an economically feasible way to slow human-driven climate change for several decades, according to a report issued by the American Physical Society and led by Princeton engineer Robert Socolow.”
What model forcings came up with that prediction? I know it says that Bob SoCO2low “said” it, but was he envious of Dr. Hansen??
News report: Ongoing expenditures of tens of billions of dollars yearly worldwide to capture carbon
dioxideemissions at fossil fuels plants with subsequent storage considered more viable than growing and storing biomass, since growing plants is not viable.Additional grant money urgently needed to further substantiate the globally-necessary initial conclusion of non-viability.
Film at 11.
They finally figured out that carbon capture is a stupid idea?
WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE???????????????
nobody has to answer I was just venting
Scottish Sceptic says:
May 9, 2011 at 3:55 pm
You may wish to play around a bit as well with the trends via this graph:
http://www.google.com/trends?q=peak+oil%2C+global+warming%2C+climate+change&ctab=0&geo=all&date=2010&sort=1
By displaying data for a given month (only the most recent are available), you can even get an indication of the number of searches. Mind you, the scale is relative to the average for the interval being one. However, Google also has the data values in absolute (I guess that is what they mean by “fixed”) values, but for that you would have to have a Google-Trends account.
Think this product has the answer – cool mug too!
http://www.uglymug.co.uk/CO2_IS_PLANT_FOOD_MUG/p735934_3520325.aspx
So, now we know that there is not any real science expertise at Princeton. Where next?
I discount the IQ of anyone who thinks that a trace gas can drive climate or that the IPCC is a scientific body by 20 points. Another 20 points, if they smoke.
Hey, dont penalise us smokers! We’re the only ones keeping the whole economy going. You can buy us a drink to say thanks. Just don’t blame us.
cagw_skeptic99 wrote:
I suppose chlorophyll based methods were not considered for a reason that I must have overlooked while reading the post.
“Three associated topics are beyond the scope of this report. First, biological and other alternative methods of CO2 removal from the air are not discussed in any depth. Rather, the report, focusing on only the DAC alternative, is intended to encourage emulation in reports that explore other alternatives.
Second, little space given to CO2 storage, the other half of “carbon dioxide capture and storage” (CCS), on the grounds that CO2 storage options would not be significantly different if CO2 were captured from a power plant or from air. The omission of CO2 storage from this report should in no way suggest to the reader that the technologies, infrastructure and regulations required for permanent CO2 storage are in hand. On the contrary, CO2 storage is not yet known to be commercially feasible at the scale required to enable DAC — or for that matter, CO2 capture from power plants — to contribute significantly to the mitigation of climate change. At least a decade of large-scale field demonstrations of CO2 storage will be required before the long-term costs of geological disposal of CO2 can be well estimated. Third, the report does not investigate roles for synthetic fuels derived from CO2 captured from air in a world where substitutes for petroleum-derived fuels are strongly desired; the report nearly exclusively focuses on a world where the primary reason for considering CO2 capture from air is to address climate change.” (excerpt from the report, page 11)
Unfortunately, I’d say. 😉
“Leading this project convinced me that scientists and engineers are poised to provide many creative strategies to reduce the risks of dangerous climate change.”
————-
I’ll bet there are …..plenty