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Global Warming Stopped By Adding Lime To Sea
Antiglobalism writes "Scientists say they have found a workable way of reducing CO2 levels in the atmosphere by adding lime to seawater. And they think it has the potential to dramatically reverse CO2 accumulation in the atmosphere, reports Cath O'Driscoll in SCI's Chemistry & Industry magazine published today."
On a chemical level, how does this differ from growing coral?
A coral bred / genetically modified to grow in a wider variety of climates could also scrub CO2 from the air. Though the 'whatcouldpossiblygowrong' crowd might be concerned with over scrubbing by the GM coral.
__ Someday, but not this morning, I'll finally learn to use the preview button.
In case anyone was wondering:
Lime = CaO
CaO + H_2O Ca(OH)_2 + 63.7kJ/mol of CaO
Ca(OH)_2 (aq) + CO_2 (g) -> CaCO_3 (s) + H_2O (l)
CaCO3(s) + CO2(g) + H2O(l) -> Ca(HCO3)2(aq)
Some of these compounds are strong bases that may be dangerous for both human consumption and wildlife contact. If this were done in segregated water areas, however, it may be possible to utilize the properties of the first reaction to produce energy via a heat engine.
My favorite is the coral reef some geniuses made out of... used tires.
Its now considered an ecological disaster.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/02/18/news/tires.php
You're absolutely correct. There's no end to the number of environmental "solutions" that led to far greater problems down the road. And the sad thing is that they were not unforeseen problems. The people who thought up the solutions figured it was easier to let subsequent generations deal with the mess; they were more interested in a quick fix for political expediency.
Anyone else of a certain age remember the animated bit from The Electric Company (then-unknown Morgan Freeman was one of the cast members) wherein the wife is freaking out about a mouse in the house? To cut a long story short, as the problems cascade, the husband gets a cat, then a dog, then a tiger, then finally an elephant to scare away the tiger. When the wife complains about the elephant, the husband says "Everyone knows elephants are afraid of mice" reintroducing the original problem and losing an entire wall of the house in the process as the panicked elephant stampedes through it. The punch line is the battered husband lying on the ground saying to himself, "You know...maybe I should have just gotten a trap...". I think that little cartoon is one of the great cautionary tales of environmental engineering.
You might not be in Margaritaville - but you might still get plastered.
WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong?
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
This couldn't possibly have any additional side-effects, right?
It remind me of another idea: to add iron particles to the ocean in order to stimulate algae growth, which absorbs quite a lot of CO2.
But what happens then? Do the oceans get clogged with algae? Do fish eat them so we get to make the fishing industry happy at the same time? Do the algae release the CO2 when they die? Or does it sink to the bottom of the ocean, taking the carbon with it?
Lots of possibilities for side effects, lots of things to research.
If only CO2 actually was the cause for global warming! Every ice core sample taken shows that CO2's only relation to warming is that as sea water gets warmer, it releases more CO2 into the atmosphere. CO2 rises lag behind temp rises by decades/centuries in all samples taken.
Yes, and then the increased CO2 causes increased warming, resulting in more CO2. It's a feedback cycle, and just because CO2 isn't the initial driver in historical cases does not mean it doesn't cause warming. It's just that in the past, it was always something else that caused the increase in temperature with the CO2 increase following.
If you were to directly introduce CO2 into the atmosphere before any other warming occurred, then it could become the driving force for the feedback cycle.
The ice cores are also unanimous in showing that CO2 levels have not been higher than they are now for hundreds of thousands of years, and that the change has occurred rapidly since the industrial revolution. So while in natural cases of warming, CO2 levels were not the initial impetus, our current situation is anything but natural. The ice cores do not imply in any way that the Greenhouse Effect doesn't work, so unless you have some other reason to think it doesn't, then this is cause for concern.
The enemies of Democracy are
That's why we ask people with more than a sophomore chemistry level.
Its takes energy to make lime (CaO). You need to start with limestone (CaCO3) and drive off the CO2. Eventually the CaO added to the water will become limestone and precipitate out. There is no magic here.
So where will this energy come from? Ans: Presumably the great new oil finds that Shell has been announcing on a regular basis for the last 30 years. Folks - oil prices might be down a little bit now but they won't stay down. And if you actually check the numbers you'll find that Shell has NOT been making much progress in replacing the oil we burn. So how about Natural Gas? More insanity.
Methane is a chemical source of hydrogen. Alkanes are C(n)H(2n+2) and for octane n=8. For methane n=1. The issue is that our liquid fuels have n>=7 so they are much closer to a 2:1 ratio of hydrogen to carbon. Now consider that coal is C(0.6n)H(n) so coal is hydrogen poor. Bitumin is about C(n)H(n). Its actually a little hydrogen rich but the issue is that if we want to produce liquid fuels via coal->liquids or via bitumin->liquids or for that matter from oil shales then we are desperately short of hydrogen and without it we leave about 1/2 the carbon we mine sitting around in piles which we call COKE. And the only other option is if we try to get energy from it and create copious amounts of CO2.
This would have to be the most INSANE use of our non-renewable natural resources that I can possibly imagine. It will result in more carbon in the atmosphere and not less.
Its a very good thing that CO2 is not responsible for global warming. It hasn't been responsible in the geological record other than back in the precambrian when CO2 concentrations reached 130,000 PPM. The levels are now about 370-380 PPM which is a rise of about 100 PPM over the last 100 years or so. Meanwhile water vapour is anywhere from under 1% (10,000 PPM) to over 10% (100,000 PPM). The issue is that water vapour acts closer to the surface of the planet and that its a stronger green house gas than CO2 and we have no idea if there has been a net positive change or a net negative change in average water vapour levels over the planet in the last say 100 years. We don't know the sign and we certainly don't know the magnitude but a 100 PPM change gets swallowed up very quickly when one considers the uncertainties involved here.
Read this: http://www.sciencebits.com/CO2orSolar
There is a high correlation between climate and sun spot activities. CERN is undertaking experiments soon to confirm this linkage. We are fortunate that solar cycle #24 is looking to be about 2 years late and if so will probably be very weak and this will provide us with the opportunity to actually do some measurement.
Rather than go berzerk with crazy ideas it will probably make more sense to see what influence solar cycle #24 has.
The Sahara.
Seriously; several thousand years ago (15,000ish, I think), the Sahara was a tropical jungle, with rivers, lakes, and gazillions of plants.
What happens is the earth warms up to the point that there's so much moisture in the air off of the Atlantic and Mediterranean that it starts raining in the desert. Essentially, global warming eventually *cools* the sahara, which blooms, and absorbs the carbon dioxide. As the earth cools off, it becomes a desert (very rapidly). The last time this happened, it went from lush jungle to desert within 200 years, possibly within a human lifetime. Must have been quite a shock.
~Wx
sig?
Here in NL they had this marvellous idea ten years ago to fence off a large piece of land and do nothing to it, just to see what happened. Now they are complaining that nature doesn't develop there as they expected. In their opinion there are too many blueberries growing, and that is not good for the development of nature. I wonder where the brains of these people went to, because they're certainly not in their heads.
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