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First Successful Demonstration of CO2 Capture Technology

Posted by samzenpus on from the scrub-that-global-warming-away dept.

An anonymous coward writes "Global Research Technologies, LLC (GRT), a technology research and development company, and Klaus Lackner from Columbia University have achieved the successful demonstration of a bold new technology to capture carbon from the air. The "air extraction" prototype has successfully demonstrated that indeed carbon dioxide (CO2) can be captured from the atmosphere. This is GRT's first step toward a commercially viable air capture device."

2 of 521 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Uh... by Alioth · · Score: 0, Redundant

    We could stop cutting down large swathes of forests for a start.

    The landfilled paper will rot and methane and CO2 will be released (which is a worse problem). If you want to do something with the paper it's best to burn it and actually get some energy out, rather than let it decompose in a landfill.

    Better still, someone else mentioned switchgrass - cellulosic ethanol is the way forward for ethanol, not ethanol from corn. Fortunately, the feedstock for cellulosic ethanol can be any invasive weed that can be grown on land that's marginal for agriculture and won't require tons of fertilizer.

    --
    Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
  2. Re:Rainforest != paper farm by AlHunt · · Score: 0, Redundant

    They are being cut done for farmland since those farmers use suboptimal farming techniques which necessitate burning through a lot of the land.

    I'd like to see something to backup those assertions. My understanding is that farmland has been decreasing in the US for a long time. According to USDA as of 2003:

    The Nation's cropland acreage declined from 420 million acres in 1982 to 368 million acres in 2003, a decrease of about 12 percent. The net decline between 1997 and 2003 was 8 million acres, or about 2 percent.

    Here's an article indicating the same thing is happening in China:

    "The amount of land dedicated to grain production is expected to continue shrinking in the years ahead, but (farm lands) will still have to produce a minimum of 500 million tons to feed China in 2010," the China Daily said.

    Not that I particularly care for food raised on modern farms, but it remains that less and less land is producing more and more food.

    --
    1 in 4 Maine children in struggle with hunger.