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0 pointsdeepsun20d ago0 comments

Re carbon capture -- we can cut trees and dump them in "carbon storage" places like the bottom of some water bodies where due to lack of oxygen no rotting happens, like peats and e.g. Black Sea.

And grow new trees in their place of course.

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tasty_freeze20d ago

Considering the scale that we are burning oil and gas, our sequestration efforts would have to be comparable. Continuing to burn oil and gas and trying to recapture it is madness, like realizing you are driving way too fast and instead of taking your foot off the gas, you keep flooring it but start applying the brakes.

If we could actually grow trees to capture carbon equivalent to 250M+ barrel of oil per day, it would be better to just grow trees and burn them for energy.

chinathrow19d ago

If we just could stop burning that oil, that would be great.

adrianN20d ago

It’s difficult to scale this to the levels we would need to make a difference.

deepsunOP19d ago

Yes, agree. But I'm not sure direct air capture is more scalable than trees. Yes trees need to be moved, but at least they grow by themselves.

adrianN19d ago

IMO DAC promises are either wishful thinking or a deliberate attempt to sabotage more aggressive climate policies.

zdragnar20d ago

Depending on the tree, freshly cut wood can have anywhere from 1:3 to 2:1 ratio of water to actual wood fiber.

So, unless we want to remove a massive amount of fresh water from the ecosystem, we also need to invest energy in drying out the wood well below natural humidity levels (transport to a desert maybe?) on top of electrifying what is currently a diesel and gas heavy industry (cutting and transporting logs with heavy machinery).

There's definitely lower hanging fruit for getting C02 out of the cycle.

MarkusQ20d ago

Dumping wet wood--even very, very wet wood in a lake and sinking it to the bottom does not "remove a massive amount of fresh water from the ecosystem". It does not remove any fresh water from the ecosystem.

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adrianN19d ago

You can make charcoal, you even get a little bit of energy out of it or can use the wood gas as chemical feedstock. It’s still completely impractical to scale to the gigatons we’d need to sequester.

lazide20d ago

The more likely candidate is mineral based, because yes trees are hard to scale this way.

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tasty_freeze20d ago

If we could actually grow trees to capture carbon equivalent to 250M+ barrel of oil per day, it would be better to just grow trees and burn them for energy.

chinathrow19d ago

If we just could stop burning that oil, that would be great.

adrianN20d ago

It’s difficult to scale this to the levels we would need to make a difference.

deepsunOP19d ago

Yes, agree. But I'm not sure direct air capture is more scalable than trees. Yes trees need to be moved, but at least they grow by themselves.

adrianN19d ago

IMO DAC promises are either wishful thinking or a deliberate attempt to sabotage more aggressive climate policies.

zdragnar20d ago

Depending on the tree, freshly cut wood can have anywhere from 1:3 to 2:1 ratio of water to actual wood fiber.

There's definitely lower hanging fruit for getting C02 out of the cycle.

MarkusQ20d ago

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adrianN19d ago

lazide20d ago

The more likely candidate is mineral based, because yes trees are hard to scale this way.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse