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Plan to Slow Global Warming By Dumping Iron Sulphate into Oceans
ananyo writes "In the search for methods of geoengineering to limit global warming, it seems that stimulating the growth of algae in the oceans might be an efficient way of removing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere after all. Despite attracting controversy and a UN moratorium, as well as previous studies suggesting that this approach was ineffective, a recent analysis of an ocean-fertilization experiment eight years ago in the Southern Ocean indicates that encouraging algal blooms to grow can soak up carbon that is then deposited in the deep ocean as the algae die. Each atom of added iron pulled at least 13,000 atoms of carbon out of the atmosphere by encouraging algal growth which, through photosynthesis, captures carbon. The team reports that much of the captured carbon was transported to the deep ocean, where it will remain sequestered for centuries — a 'carbon sink' (abstract)."
And the side effects are not all bad: it should increase the amount of fish that can be sustainably harvested.
The 2 side effects mentioned in the article both kill fish. Toxic algal blooms poison fish, either causing them to grow abnormally or death. Depleted oxygen levels does the same thing to the fish as it does to you, suffocation.
I took a course on oceanography a few years ago, and we actually studied this. I'll summarize my professor's powerpoint notes as best I can.
Iron is a limiting nutrient in phytoplankton growth. This is not in dispute. However if we are to add iron to the ocean in order to increase phytoplankton counts, and thus to increase CO2 uptake then we must consider several things. Firstly, how much CO2 will be semi-permanently transported to the ocean floor. In terms of percentages, if increased phytoplankton counts caused a CO2 flux in the surface layer of 50 Gt Carbon / year, the corresponding CO2 flux to the ocean floor would be about 0.7 Gt Carbon / year. This is due to the fact that the mechanisms of carbon transport from the surface to the sea floor (the "biological pump") is quite inefficient. Thus the increase in phytoplankton at the surface would have to be HUGE to transport meaningful amounts of CO2 to the sea floor.
Secondly, there may be dire unintended or undesired consequences of increasing the surface phytoplankton counts. Imagine we put significant amounts of iron in the ocean and imagine that surface phytoplankton counts increased significantly. At the surface we could get increased CO2 uptake and O2 production. But what happens when those phytoplankton die? They sink. And when they sink to deeper layers, other organisms would decompose them. Those decomposers would be oxygen breathers and would consume oxygen at the deeper layer. If their numbers increased due to increased dead phytoplankton, the decomposers could deplete the O2 levels in that level, creating anoxic zones at deeper levels in the ocean. In addition, some of these decomposers might be methane producing bacteria, especially in the absence of oxygen. That methane might make its way into the ocean. The worry is that the imbalanced increase in phytoplankton might result in an anoxic jellyfish ocean that would be rather unfriendly to fish like salmon, tuna, and the other common species that currently exist.
Unless the above arguments have been refuted, I don't know why iron fertilization is still being pushed as a realistic option. It seems to me that many decision makers are nearly completely illiterate in science.
This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when first he appears as a protector - Plato (423 to 327 BC)
"I always worry about these ideas, they seem good in theory, but in reality you can just end up with a cane toad problem..."
Mod parent up.
Without any doubt. FAR more study would have to be done, over a LONG period of time, before any direct messing with the ecology should be attempted.
I live near a lake that was once called, by National Geographic, one of the 12 most beautiful lakes in the world (and it is a rather large lake, as such things go). And there were wonderful fish in the lake; salmonids, plentiful and tasty.
Local businesses, recognizing that fishing was a major tourist attraction, pressured the state Fish & Wildlife Commission to "improve" the fishery.
I could go on for a long time. But suffice it to say that they did one thing that was well-intended, and supposed to help the fish population. But it had unintended consequences. Then they fooled with the ecology again, to try to fix their first fuckup, but THAT had unintended consequences. Then they did it AGAIN, to fix that one, and THAT had unintended consequences.
The long and short of it is: they averted total disaster from their first mistakes, but the fishery is nowhere near as healthy and strong and plentiful as when they first tried to intervene. And yes, it is all directly attributable to their actions.
BE VERY CAREFUL BEFORE YOU FUCK WITH THE ECOLOGY. THE LAW OF UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES IS LIKELY TO BITE YOU IN THE ASS.
We have seen this in so many different ways. These people should have their heads examined if they propose to do it anytime soon. Long-term study is needed, even if things get bad. Anyone who tries it before thorough long-term studies are done is probably deserving of being taken out and shot.
"In all seriousness, why do you feel the need to keep the name of the lake a secret? Is it because you are pulling your entire story out of your ass? The environment is quite an important thing to say the least, but lying does not help your agenda if you truly support serious environmental evidence and action."
In all seriousness, it's because I don't want YOU to know where I live, dumbshit.
You could have just not mentioned you lived there, and included the name.
It's generally the environmentalists yelling about global warming the loudest, and shortly thereafter telling everyone that the solution is to go back to living in caves (quite literally).
But it's not a complete misconception... Scientists don't quite say it, but it's clearly implied, because seriously reduced consumption and activity is currently the only way to make as big of a dent in CO2 production as they advocate.
There are major things like cement production, which alone emits about 6% of total man-made greenhouse gases, for which there seems to be absolutely no possible option to significantly reduce the CO2 emissions, other than simply stopping cement production. With cement being one of the most important construction materials, this directly translates into stopping most large building construction, and a severe economic crash.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Because you've got to make your strawman look really ugly before people will want to set fire to it.
Actually, I've found it's the people doing the polluting who claim that polluting less would mean everyone would have to go live in caves, I can't say I've ever heard a serious environmentalist argue we should do so*.
* Excepting the one group that advocates building homes in caves, but to be faire, the caves they want people to live in are better than the houses that most people live in now.
There are major things like cement production, which alone emits about 6% of total man-made greenhouse gases, for which there seems to be absolutely no possible option to significantly reduce the CO2 emissions, other than simply stopping cement production. With cement being one of the most important construction materials, this directly translates into stopping most large building construction, and a severe economic crash.
The goal is to reduce overall emissions to a sustainable level, they don't need to be cut to 0. Imagine for a moment that we were rational creatures, we could use taxes levied on carbon emissions to fund carbon sequestration, to achieve a net-0 emissions rate. We also don't need to cut every industry identically. For instance, if the will existed, we could switch the world to mostly electric vehicles in a generation. That would greatly cut transportation emissions while potentially increasing power generation emissions, while still reducing overall emissions.
There are alternate methods of concrete production that produce lower emissions, they aren't used because they are more expensive than the cheapest methods and CO2 emissions cost the company nothing. That's one reason why taxing emissions makes economic and environmental sense. If CO2 emissions have a cost, it makes the processes that emit less CO2 comparatively more cost-efficient (and it spurs more research into making those processes more cost-effective).
Fanatically anti-fanatical