Russell Cook writes:
I kid you not. From tonight’s (8/23/16) PBS NewsHour broadcast segment titled “To combat climate change, these scientists are turning CO2 into rock“, these quotes from the discussion segment host and two of the speakers, regarding recapturing CO2 from Icelandic geothermal activity:
MALCOLM BRABANT: “Because it is self-contained within the geothermal power plant, the CarbFix solution cannot be used for capturing CO2 from planes, cars and ships like this one in a Norwegian fjord. But Professor Gislason believes there should be international law requiring countries to start using this new technique.”
SIGGI GISLASON, CarbFix: “The more diffuse emissions like from jets, cars, et cetera, is going to be more complicated, but still 40 percent of the emissions could theoretically be captured and stored in rocks. There is no question we need legislation to force people to do this.”
MALCOLM BRABANT: But even here in Iceland, it’s not being used to its full extent.
BERGUR SIGFUSSON: Seventy-five percent of the CO2 is emitted at the moment. Of the CO we take up to the surface, approximately 25 percent are reinjected directly to form the carbonates, minerals.
[……..]
MALCOLM BRABANT: But if you’re trying to save the planet, why don’t you put in 100 percent?
HILDIGUNNUR THORSTEINSSON: Well, when we were testing the technology, we didn’t know if it would work. And so we only started injecting two years ago. We’re still proving that we can keep it all down there, everything turns to minerals. As the future progresses, we might do more. We haven’t decided.
Rocks? Get back to me when they can turn CO2 into something useful, like oil.
Plants have been doing that for millions of years.
Unfortunately it takes millions of years.
Ye Gods! If I had a sympathy bone I’d be embarrassed for them.
CO2 dissolved in water creates some carbonic acid. In certain rocks, such as basalt, this acid will combine with the rock to create calcium carbonate, as they demonstrated. This will not happen in granite or sandstone which are acidic rocks.
There are more problems with their idea. 1) At small scale it might work but if you try more you will foul your injection well, as someone pointed out above. 2) I seriously doubt that you can dissolve a ton of CO2 in 5 tons of water. That would be an impossible concentration. 3) they have plenty of water to use because it is a geothermal well and they can just use the cooled water they pumped up. 4) they have not demonstrated that the CO2 they are pumping down is actually turned into carbonate –or at least they didn’t in the interview. 5) in a power plant, the cost to separate the CO2 and pump it somewhere is very high, not like the geothermal plant case.
The Illinois CCS experiment to inject into a sandstone formation failed. The [formation] was a naturally briny aquifer. cO2 plus brine formed scaly carbonates. The sandstone around the injection well plugged in weeks. Rinse and repeat. Total technical failure.
CO2 Sequestering Simplified
Back in 2010, Duke University released an alarming study which indicates that the greatest hope of sequestering CO2 produced by coal fired power plants, the injection of CO2 into underground formations, has a high likelihood of leaking from the formations and contaminating aquifers. That kills what seemed like a good idea, but there is another approach.
Some folks have suggested that since the oceans quite naturally sequester vast amounts of CO2 already, if one could find a way to speed up the process just a little, you might keep up with the human combustion of fossil fuel.
The same natural sequestration of CO2 is also true for shallow fresh water ponds with their prolific algal growth in the summer. I see a huge potential for a green, sustainable (not to mention utopian) lifestyle growing up around coal fired power plants. Infrastructure costs to establish such communities are minimal. All that is required is that shallow fresh water pools be installed with piped in CO2 from the power plant for accelerated plant growth. Warm water containing the waste heat from the power plant would also be injected into the pools to maintain a constant warm temperature during the colder months.
Seed the water with the most prolific and nutritious algae species. For floral diversity and as a human habitat construction resource, plant willows around the shore. Within two years you will have a Garden of Eden.
Willows are easily woven so could be used to make both the rafts and paddles to be used by the inhabitants for recreation, exercise and food gathering. The first two of those activities will have to become an essential element of the culture of the inhabitants since agitation of the water is needed to accelerate algal growth. Willows will also be used to make the structural skeletons of the wattle and daub dwellings for the inhabitants. The architectural concepts conceived of by J.R.R. Tolkien could be adapted to the wattle and daub technology to provide very cozy living spaces. Young willow shoots can also be woven into baskets and sandals.
The staple food for the inhabitants will be the algae collected from the pond. It can easily be gathered and set out in mats to dry in the sun. The dried mats would be cut up into convenient sized biscuits for later consumption. Thus, the use of fire for food preparation is not needed thereby avoiding generating any CO2 from cooking. The use of fire to provide personal warmth is also not needed since there is the immediate availability of the warm pond as a refuge in the cold winter months just as the Japanese Macaque monkeys have learned to do.
The power plant sponsoring each pond community should grant half acre or acre homesteads to the pioneers who come to live there. This will imbue a pride of ownership in the inhabitants and encourage them to be good custodians of the environment in which they live.
For those who are of a spiritual bent, a single oak or cypress tree could be planted in each community to provide a focal point for worship and social events. To prevent backsliding or succumbing to the temptations of the material world, each community should have an enclave set aside and inhabited by a cadre of spiritual leaders. The minimum qualification for such leaders is that they be bona fide AGW proponents, having published at least one peer reviewed paper on the subject. Subaltern ranks of the spiritual leader class could be filled by environmental reporters who have kept the faith and been martyred by skeptics.
Immigration into the communities should be limited to those who are young and idealistic and can be expected to have children to sustain the community in coming generations. Aging hippies should be discouraged from homesteading in the community – they are the class of people most likely to introduce mind altering plants and animals to a clear headed population. The community could not survive with half the population licking cane toads and soaking in the warm pool. It needs a vibrant young population out on the pond paddling around, agitating the algae and gathering the fruits of the earth.
By the turn of the century such communities would be in their third or fourth generation and have developed such diverse and quaint customs that they would necessarily attract a considerable tourist trade. The associated power company could profit from the tourist trade and as a consequence provide electricity to their customers at a reduced price. This is a win-win solution for all concerned with the issue. The first coal fired power plant in Britain, Australia or California in many years would surely be quickly permitted if such a plan were proposed. If necessary, we may have to compromise and not exclude the aging hippies and cane toads. The hippies’ horticultural skills at growing hemp could be an asset in providing the community with a source of fiber for clothing, floor mats and rope.
This idea is a patentable invention but I, like Benjamin Franklin and his lightning rod invention, am here-by donating the invention to the world for the benefit of all mankind. Feel free to forward my invention to anyone you know who is as concerned about the problem as I am.
The inhabitants will need to be taught to shun excitement, and leaving the village is to be seen as “adventuring”, and simply not done by proper folk.
The leader of each village should be given a ring. A Great Ring. A Ring of Power.
And One Ring, to rule them all, and in the darkness, bind them.
Things could get interesting after a while.
Brilliant!
It should be noted that all anthropogenic CO2 was once in the atmosphere. We are merely returning it to its natural place to the proven benefit of the entire biosphere,
We need more than .04.
Love, Kat
Yep, just returning accidentally buried carbon back into the shorter term Carbon Cycle that provides for ALL life on Earth..
Yes…even for the alarmist… even THEY are TOTALLY reliant on adequate atmospheric CO2,
and 400ppm is barely adequate.
How much carbon is accounted for in CO2 in the atmosphere compared to other places:
(See Wiki: Carbon Cycle) in gigatons (GT)
Atmosphere: 720 GT
Terrestrial biosphere: 2,000 GT (living and dead)
Ocean organic: 1,000 GT
Ocean inorganic: 37,400 GT
Fossil Fuels: 4,130 GT (90% coal and peat)
Lithosphere Kerogens: 15,000,000 GT
Lithosphere Carbonates: more than 60,000,000 GT
There is 100,000 times more carbon locked in terrestrial kerogen and carbonates than is in the current atmosphere. Yet at some time or other, every one of these carbon atoms must have spent time in the atmosphere as CO2.
I submit a limiting factor of 2,000 GT of Carbon in the terrestrial biosphere is the paltry 720 GT in the atmosphere. Most forms of life on this planet make it their business to sequester carbon into calcium carbonate, into bone, into carapace, into cellulose. Some of this carbon is returned to the atmosphere via volcanos, weathering, and termites. But it is not a steady state condition. For the past 650 million years, since life learned to make hard body parts, shells, and reefs, life itself has been sequestering carbon, the very element that makes life possible. 99.99% of all carbon that used to be in the biosphere is now locked up in stone or buried underground.
What species has made it’s business the recycling of sequestered carbon back into the biosphere?
Homosapians
We humans are far from being a scourge, a curse, a virus on this planet. Instead, we are an essential link in the “circle of life”. By our penchant, our talent, our skill at unlocking the treasure of buried and sequestered carbon, we coal-burning, hydrocarbon-pumping, shale-fracking, cement-kilning humans are returning essential life-giving carbon to the atmosphere and biosphere.
Who thinks the trees would object to a rising CO2 level if they had a vote?
(Ref: a comment in 2014)
@arthur
‘cusp of revolutionizing all power production’
A solution in search of problem. The power industry is not having a problem meeting demand. Many critics think we should do it a different way but since they do not have any experience making power, there advice is ignored. For good reason!
“The rest of the world is not as dumb as the USA and will universalize molten salt reactors –…”
Of course all (I can not think of an exception) new commercial reactors are clones of US LWR from the 60s. The US did not dictate what the best choice of reactors should be. Several countries developed design that were best for them.
“… starting with the Chinese , who will once again demonstrate their superiority over this country in practically everything..”
Doing something 50 years after others have done it not a sign of superiority. Let me know when China has built more than 100 large reactors, has a large fleet of nuclear subs and aircraft carriers.
Let me know when China gets air pollution under control. Let me know when China achieves coal miner safety rates of the US.
Let me know when a Chinese Christian does not look around before whispering to a foreigner, ‘I am a Christian.’
So while I have a lot of nice things to say about the Chinese people, not so much good about the government. After the slave labor coal policy failed the have turned to nuclear which is an improvement.
“China went from a nuclear nobody to the premier”
Do you mean the reactor designed in Pittsburgh and Charlotte NC? Or do you mean the design I worked on in Virginia before going to China? Credit Bush for making it possible for US companies to do nuclear work for China. China has not advanced the state of the art in nuclear.
‘struggling to build four of them’
I did not know the US was struggling. The US is #1 in nuclear generation and there is no close second. We need to have a plan to replace reactors, that is why we are building four with many more in the licensing pipeline.
France had planned to replace their fleet but has adopted the US approach of keeping existing reactors running by replacing steam generators.
Putting drama aside, the world does not need an unlimited supply of power to cheap to meter. We need a finite supply of affordable priced power. We have that now.
That scheme makes about as much sense as plumbing your sewage back into the river – upstream of where you draw water.
@tadchem,
Aside from the hydrodynamic power issue, can you think of a better way to ensure that your water treatment is effective than to return the treated water upstream of your intake?
It’s another form of “Eating your own Cooking“
Stephen,
He said “sewage”, not treated water. I’ve never heard anybody refer to “sewage” as treated water. Nice strawman though.
The dominant gasses that drive volcanic eruptions include water, carbon dioxide, methane, hydrochloric acid, sulfur dioxide and in the case of Iceland, hydrofluoric acid. Mother nature can be so unkind.
I don’t understand all the science on wuwt but the humour is so clever I just have to keep reading.
Patrick
Good people, 1st and last is human rights and protecting environment –
But Professor Gislason believes there should be international law requiring countries to start using this new technique.
– Oh wait, 1st and last are laws.
__________________________________________
They could found a startup, search for investors and sell ‘you saved the world’ certificates.
But that’s another story.