So they take CO2 from the atmosphere and chemically transform it into solid materials that reduce greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere?
Congratulations you have invented plants.
Weeks instead of years. Could be big for assisting in the fight against climate change.
The downside of that kind of stuff is that you need a balance. Scrub too much CO2 and it’s trouble again.
If we can get atmospheric CO2 back down to where it was 100 years ago that would be an amazing problem to have.
Look up the Oxygen Catastropy, also called Oxygen Holocaust.
That’s what happens if too much carbon is removed from the atmosphere and thus there’s too much oxygen in it.
It sounds like you have no idea the magnitudes involved, or the timelines. You’re talking about something that took place over a period of 400 million years and whose effects (the presence of oxygen in our atmosphere and our oceans) remain. There’s no chance that geoengineering would change the oxygen levels to anything we can’t handle, and if it starts to head down that direction we can easily handle it (just stop the processes that would sequester carbon).
It’s like being worried that your air conditioning is going to freeze your pipes in the house, in the middle of summer.
You’re probably right, but bioengineering this to self-propogate quickly in the environment would be exponential. I’m sure that isn’t the plan, but it could be done, and it could make this an issue. We shouldn’t let that stop us because we’re currently in an exponential fuck up in the opposite direction, but it is something to think about.
The article talks about mass producing the enzymes themselves, not the life forms that produce the enzymes. It’s a key distinction.
Plus these organisms already live on this earth. They can’t outcompete other life on the surface, in less harsh conditions.
I think microbes are probably a lot easier, faster, and more cost effective to produce compared to plants. It can survive in harsh conditions and create rock from the C02 at a fast rate according to the article.
Not only that, but they believe the active enzymes in the microbe can be optimized and engineered, then mixed into a liquid substrate. Becomes an enzyme-based CO2 filter with the byproduct of Calcium Carbonate, which can be used in concrete. The article talks about filling trucks with these and passing the emissions of coal-fired power plants through them.
That would be an incredible innovation. You don’t have to stop at coal either, it’s just the dirtiest. Nat gas, trash, oil, wood and anything else burned on a huge scale could be curbed.
What about all the farting that cows do?
The trouble with cow farts is the methane, a much more potent greenhouse gas that eventually turns back into CO2 in the atmosphere anyway. Concentrated methane sources tend to either be captured for use as fuel, or flared with a burning flame to reduce the greenhouse effect (at which point carbon sequestering might work). Less concentrated sources, like livestock farts, can’t really be dealr with in the same way.
Read the article. They’re hoping to mass manufacture the enzymes involved, which have the following advantages over carbon capture through plant life:
- Can work in much harsher environments, with higher operating temperatures, pressures, and acidity.
- Captures the carbon in calcium carbonate, which is more stable in retaining the carbon compared to decomposing plant matter.
- Works much faster than plants do
