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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."

11 of 521 comments (clear)

  1. Uh... by w3woody · · Score: 5, Funny

    Don't they call things that absorb CO2 from the air Trees...?

    And couldn't we sequester CO2 from the atmosphere by converting trees into an inert substance--such as paper--then burying it into landfills?

    I mean--couldn't we get a 'win/win' here by simply outlawing the recycling of paper?

    1. Re:Uh... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Right, because trees grow instantaneously, bleach themselves, and require no transportation or other effort to be made into trees.

    2. Re:Uh... by TapeCutter · · Score: 5, Interesting

      "Actually the more people need paper the more trees get planted to supply that demand"

      I think you will find most paper pulp comes from native hardwood forests, eg: Indonesia, Malaysia, S.America and even here in Australia. Some wealthy countries replant and/or carefully manage the natural regrowth, most just hack it down leaving large areas of barren hills. In Australia we plant non-native pine trees for timber resulting in vast areas of land covered with a pine tree monoculture that is largely devoid of any other lifeforms (even the bugs refuse to live in those forests).

      Speaking of cost, how much do you think it costs to cut a ton of timber, turn it into chips, ship it from Australia to Japan and then turn it into paper that is shipped all over the planet. I will wager those costs are far more than the cost of an extra garbage run to collect a ton of used paper that is ready for pulping. Having worked at a sawmill many moons ago the waste timber that was chipped on site was collected by a truck and driven ~200miles to a sea port.

      --
      And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
    3. Re:Uh... by Bender_ · · Score: 5, Informative


      Yes, but the paper companies only plant single species fast growing trees. Those can not replace the complex ecosystem in the rain forests.

    4. Re:Uh... by gerrysteele · · Score: 5, Funny

      So what about genetically modified trees that consume superstancial amounts of CO2?

      Trees that grow high into the sky. Trees that grow so big we can build cities in their overlapping branches.

      Trees my friends that bear bounties fruits and sustenance for all mankind alike?

      Trees so beautiful they would make a grown man weep in awe.

      And these trees I sayeth, they shall become our new friend. Our new master. Our new servant.

      All hail our new genetically modified tree overlords.

    5. Re:Uh... by sentientbeing · · Score: 5, Funny

      Actally, Ents have been observed in the wild to strip off their own leaves, bleach themselves and climb into recycling chipping machines in paper mills when depressed.

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      beware he who would deny you access to information, for in his mind he dreams himself your master
    6. Re:Uh... by jonadab · · Score: 5, Informative

      > I think you will find most paper pulp comes from native hardwood forests

      Hardwoods for the most part can be sold as lumber and are more valuable in that form than as paper, even in the poorest countries. Making paper out of oak and maple is financially the equivalent to melting down dimes and reforming them in the shape of nickels. I'm not saying it never happens, but it is not the norm. Paper is generally made from fast-growth wood that doesn't make very valuable lumber, typically pine or other conifers.

      What's really interesting is that it requires less total financial outlay, and less energy (discounting solar radiation that would otherwise not be harnessed), to maintain fast-growth pine plantations and make paper from those, versus recycling paper. Of all the things that you can recycle, paper is substantially the least worthwhile, both environmentally and economically. (The most worthwhile is probably glass, but just about any metal is quite worth recycling too. Plastics vary.)

      --
      Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
    7. Re:Uh... by inviolet · · Score: 5, Informative

      Hi. I own a pine tree farm outside of Cleveland, Texas, and I am here to reply to your assertions.

      I think you will find most paper pulp comes from native hardwood forests, eg: Indonesia, Malaysia, S.America and even here in Australia.

      Hardwood is a piss-poor way to generate pulpwood, because hardwood grows so slowly. The softwood pines, and some of the new varieties of grasses, are much more efficient. The majority of American industrial woodpulp comes from American and Canadian softwoods (although this is changing; see below). We are also seeing the slow rise of an industry around the pulpy grasses.

      Some wealthy countries replant and/or carefully manage the natural regrowth, most just hack it down leaving large areas of barren hills.

      Not in America. That means that if there is any brazen hacking going on, or urban sprawl, it is balanced by new plantings elsewhere.

      In Australia we plant non-native pine trees for timber resulting in vast areas of land covered with a pine tree monoculture that is largely devoid of any other lifeforms (even the bugs refuse to live in those forests).

      While the pine-trees are indeed bred to be "supertrees", their resistance is aimed at diseases and at early competition (i.e. they are bred to grow a tall canopy as fast as possible in order to beat out woody competition). The bugs don't care -- in fact I will think of your statement next time I'm in my monoculture forest swatting (or running from) the hordes of insects. For that matter, part of my land is wettish river bottomland, completely covered in random wild trees, yet the larger critters and the birds seem to prefer the drier pines.

      Still, you are right that a pine forest's understory and associated critters are relatively sparse... but that is not due to monoculture; it is true of any pine forest, even the much-vaunted old-growth redwoods in California. This is because pine needles naturally acidify the soil, and most other plants can't tolerate that. It is the pine's own natural anticompetitive practice.

      Either way, pines (and other softwoods) are still the fastest way to sequester large amounts of airborn carbon. Your beloved understory vegetation has a fast grow/die/rot cycle which does not permanently sequester any carbon, and which slows down the trees which do. Perhaps you should disentangle your pro-carbon-sequestration argument from your pro-biodiversity argument, because the fastest and most profitable way to sequester airborne carbon is also the least biodiverse. (And if you compromise on "most profitable", then brace yourself for the world's unwillingness to do it.) The reverse is also true: the most biodiverse place in the world is the rainforest, and rainforests have so much rot that they do not consume any net carbon at all. (If you think they do, I'd love to hear an explanation of where they're storing it.)

      Speaking of cost, how much do you think it costs to cut a ton of timber, turn it into chips, ship it from Australia to Japan and then turn it into paper that is shipped all over the planet. I will wager those costs are far more than the cost of an extra garbage run to collect a ton of used paper that is ready for pulping. Having worked at a sawmill many moons ago the waste timber that was chipped on site was collected by a truck and driven ~200miles to a sea port.

      True enough. Domestic timber production is the answer... and indeed was the answer here in America. We had a great pulp market until the feds, under pressure from Environmentalists, banned logging in national forestlands. That drove a lot of the domestic mills out of business, and when they died, the bottom fell out of the pulp market. Presently, I will be paid $0 for the pulpwood take from this year's thinning. Now what effect do you suppose that will have on

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      FATMOUSE + YOU = FATMOUSE
  2. How much coal to power this? by SEWilco · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The article does not mention how much carbon needs to be burned to power the device.

  3. The spice must flow. by Meph_the_Balrog · · Score: 5, Insightful
    FTA:

    Extensive deployment of the GRT air capture system makes it possible to envision an actual reduction of CO2 levels in the atmosphere, perhaps even to pre-industrial levels.

    I find this idea somewhat concerning. All too often the human race is guilty of doing things because they can, before they learn whether or not they should. I'm all for reducing carbon emissions, but in all honesty, what the hell will we break if we start trying to extract too much carbon from the atmosphere.

    Mind you, find a way to quickly and efficiently separate the carbon from the oxygen, install in long range space craft and you suddenly have near limitless air for deep space voyages.
  4. No, not so much by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 5, Informative

    Wood pulp is mostly soft wood, with spruce, pine and fir being real popular. Hardwood is sometimes used, but much more rarely and then generally birch. In the US at least a large amount of it is grown just for that purpose. There is neither the need nor reason to use old growth. Young, small, even diseased and dying trees do just fine. Thus it is fairly economical to farm them.

    Old, large trees of the hardwood variety are much more valuable for construction and thus you see them used there. No point in using an expensive tree for paper when a cheap one does quite well.

    That's not to say there's no reason to recycle, but please let's not spread BS about paper production. It is not people sneaking in to the rain forest and cutting down huge, thousand year old trees. It's tree farms in the US growing some scraggly pine and pulping that.