Capturing Carbon : We Have The Technology, Why Aren't We Doing It?

Are you seriously suggesting that we sweep it under the rug and pretend that we have responsibly dealt with anything? I have a better idea, lets split the CO2 into Carbon and Oxygen, we will breathe the oxygen and apply tremendous pressure to the carbon until it turns into diamonds and then we will sell the diamonds and this will pay for the whole process.

I forgot to add that we don't need the technology because we have plants and they will symbiotically recycle the co2 for us and the plants are not nervous about the costs of doing it.

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This product calls for sequestration of CO2 in construction materials........<br />
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<p>---<br>"When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change." <br />
-Max Planck<br />
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No, I'm not suggesting anything. CBC is. And, I agree.

Earth's atmosphere is around 0.09% CO2, and that is responsible for the habitable environment we enjoy. Doubling it will result in a very uncomfortable environment.

Trees are a wonderful absorber of CO2. Trouble is, we are destroying them quickly too. Destruction of the Amazon rainforest not only releases CO2 into the atmosphere, but then there are fewer trees to absorb the CO2 that remains. Cracking the CO2 to C4 + O2 would be wonderful, but it would require quite a bit of energy to do it. And, changing the ratio of O2 and Co2 in the atmosphere could lead to global cooling.

Sequestering the CO2 to where we got the oil from to begin with is win-win. Less pollution, less CO2. And if the CO2 is put back in place of the oil, it acts as a 'detergent' to scrub more oil from the rock, making oil fields such as the one in Southern Saskatchewan (mentioned in the article) produce oil longer.

What is the long term effect of releasing all the CO2 that has been trapped in Oil for millions of years? We don't know. We shouldn't release it back to the environment until we do know.

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"I think it's important to always carry enough technology to restart civilization, should it be necessary." Mark Tilden

Trees take the CO2 and split it into carbon and oxygen, they release the O2 into the environment, and as you point out , we are decimating trees at a greater rate than we are replacing them therefore releasing O2 into the atmosphere shouldn't cause an imbalance resulting in an ice age. Besides that ice ages and other big weather cycles are cause by the sun or earth orbit abnormalities or earth wobble abnormalities or a combination of some or all the aforementioned causes.

If you pump CO2 into an empty oilwell it will not scrub the oil out of the fissures or off the walls. The pressure will cause the oil to stay right where it is and that will be the end of that story until something fails and then a gusher of CO2 death will spill into the atmosphere.

The correct way to handle the problem is to stop burning fuels which give CO2 as a product of the process. The whole scenario you describe is a way to make ignorant people think that flim flammery is a good way to deal with serious problems while making them pay extra for piping the problem under the rug.

"we are decimating trees at a greater rate than we are replacing them therefore releasing O2 into the atmosphere shouldn't cause an imbalance resulting in an ice age."<br />
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But it just might. The ratio of oxygen to nitrogen to Co2 in our atmosphere is a unique balance. Increasing the O2 will reduce the proportion of Co2. CO2 is the gas responsible for our atmosphere retaining heat. That may indeed cause global cooling.<br />
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"If you pump CO2 into an empty oilwell it will not scrub the oil out of the fissures or off the walls. "<br />
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Walls? Contrary to common belief, an oil field is not some vast 'swimming pool' of fluid. It's embedded sometimes at great pressure in porus rock. The oil that flows is because of that pressure. Releasing that pressure causes not all of the oil to be retrievable. CO2 can act as an agent to release the remaining oil from the rock.<br />
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From the article:<br />
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"And a (coal-gasification) utility in Beulah, North Dakota, is shipping approximately 1.5 million tonnes of CO2 each year over 200 kilometres by pipeline to our very own Weyburn, Sask., where it is being re-injected into an old oil field to help with the recovery of new deposits."<br />
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More in depth:<br />
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<a href="http://www.fossil.energy.gov/news/techlines/2004/tl_weyburn_phase2.html">http://www.fossil.energy.gov/news/techlines/2004/tl_weyburn_phase2.html</a><br />
<a href="http://www.sk25.ca/Default.aspx?DN=94,93,16,1,documents">http://www.sk25.ca/Default.aspx?DN=94,93,16,1,documents</a><br />
<a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20070210.GEO10/TPStory/Environment">http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20070210.GEO10/TPStory/Environment</a><br />
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"The correct way to handle the problem is to stop burning fuels which give CO2 as a product of the process. "<br />
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And about as likely as us moving back to caves.<br />
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"The whole scenario you describe is a way to make ignorant people think that flim flammery is a good way to deal with serious problems while making them pay extra for piping the problem under the rug."<br />
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No, it about cleaning up a polluting industry, and using that pollution for some environmental benefit for a change.<p>---<br>"I think it's important to always carry enough technology to restart civilization, should it be necessary." Mark Tilden<br />

No, it is not about cleaning up a polluting industry, it is about pretending to clean up a polluting industry.

Not all oil is in fissures or pores, some is inside cavernous structures which can be referred to as pools and the sides can be called walls.

Just because some monolithic corporate monster says that hiding its waste products is helping production doesn't mean that it is actually helping anything, but it makes the whole dirty business sound more palatable.

When hydrogen is burnt you get heat and water as byproducts, therefore if you want to clean up the world a little, the way to do it is to move to hydrogen as the main fuel source. It can be produced using regenerative energy sources, windmills, etc. A lot can be done but big business wants to use resources that it has the monopoly rights to.

The analogy is you have a boat with a big hole in it that's rapidly filling with water. Instead of patching the hole to stop the boat from sinking, you instead find ever more imaginative and complex ways of bailing out the water.

All we have to do is stop killing off all the trees and stop pumping all that shit into the atmosphere, but no that would be too simple, so we instead find ever more imaginative and complex ways of bailing out the raging activity of global destruction while doing nothing to stop it.

I live in an area that has vast reserves of Methane gas. As you know, extractting the gas also means millions of gallons of water must be extracted first. The water is polluted! SO the theory is to send the water back where it came from. Not a plan to hold the water during the extraction of gas but a plan to allow drilling of Methane gas. The plan is to now allow drilling for the gas on Vancouver Island with the thought of doing as I explained. The plan goes further not to restrict where the wells will be drilled. supposedly no one owns the property under their homes. I have been paying a levy on my rare mineral rights and already declined two Calgary companies offer to lease those rights. Perhaps Campbell dosen't concur with me. Perhaps he feels that millions of gallons of water can be contained above ground untill the extraction of methane will finish. How many dry wells will be applicable to receive the CO2?

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Expect little from life and get more from it.