Carbon Hubs
Carbon has gotten a bad rap the last twenty-five years or so.
It’s important to understand that carbon is an essential element for all life forms on earth. And carbon dioxide – CO2 – is part of that essential.
Whether these life forms take in CO2 to help manufacture food or release carbon as part of respiration, the intake and output of carbon is a component of all plant, animal and human life.
Carbon is also in a constant state of movement from place to place. It is stored in what are known as reservoirs, and it moves between these reservoirs through a variety of processes, including photosynthesis, burning fossil fuels, and simply releasing breath from the lungs. The movement of carbon from reservoir to reservoir is known as the carbon cycle.
Carbon can be stored in a variety of reservoirs, including plants and animals, which is why they are considered carbon life forms. Carbon is used by plants to build leaves and stems, which are then digested by animals and used for cellular growth. In the atmosphere, carbon is stored in the form of gases, such as carbon dioxide. It is also stored in oceans, captured by many types of marine organisms. Some organisms, such as clams or coral, use carbon to form shells and skeletons. Most of the carbon on the planet is contained within rocks, minerals, and other sediment buried beneath the surface of the planet.
Because Earth is a closed system, the amount of carbon on the planet never changes. However, the amount of carbon in a specific reservoir can change over time as carbon moves from one reservoir to another. As mentioned, carbon in the atmosphere is captured by plants to make food during photosynthesis. This ingested carbon is stored in animals that eat the plants. When the animals die, they decompose, and their remains become sediment, trapping the stored carbon in layers that eventually turn into rock or minerals. Some of this sediment might form fossil fuels, such as coal, oil, or natural gas, which release carbon back into the atmosphere when the fuel is burned.
The carbon cycle is vital to life on Earth. Nature tends to keep carbon levels balanced, meaning that the amount of carbon naturally released from reservoirs is equal to the amount that is naturally absorbed by reservoirs. Maintaining this carbon balance allows the planet to remain hospitable for life. Many scientists believe that humans have upset this balance by burning fossil fuels, which has added more carbon to the atmosphere than it should and led to climate change and global warming.
While these scientists believe they can explain it all as human generated, they cannot explain everything. For example, why or how did a large strip of Atlantic Ocean along the equator cool at record speed this past summer? Michael McPhaden, a senior scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is quoted: “It could be some transient feature that has developed from processes that we don’t quite understand.” Hello! You likely didn’t see or hear a word about this cooling. It doesn’t fit the climate change narrative. But maybe weather on earth cannot be simplified by making it linear – as computer models are programmed to reflect – and drawing a straight line.
Experts tell us in around a billion years, solar radiation will be strong enough to rip apart carbon dioxide. Without the gas, photosynthesis will grind to a standstill, and oxygen will fall to levels not seen since those very early days billions of years ago.
But I digress.
I think it’s time to be more pragmatic. The U.S. and Europe have spent trillions and trillions to develop, create and subsidize “green” energy – focusing on solar and wind. The problem with those energy sources is they are expensive and unreliable in a world with a growing need for electricity – and they have their own pollution carryovers.
While affordable neutral carbon energy sources are developed, why don’t we and others put money into capturing carbon, including CO2 (and other emissions)?
The technology already exists. The major oil companies are far along in capturing carbon emissions.
A carbon dioxide (CO2) storage hub is a deep geological reservoir where emissions from carbon-intensive industries are captured and permanently stored. CO2 storage hubs offer a solution for what are known as hard-to-abate sectors. Industries such as petrochemical, power, steel and cement manufacturing are examples of essential product production where it’s difficult to decrease carbon concentration or intensity.
Carbon storage is frequently served by pipes that transport the carbon to the hub. They are considered hubs because they collect and store CO2 emissions from multiple industries located within piping distance from the hub.
Carbon capture is not cheap as yet, but when I think of all the money spent, being spent for solar and wind, and the planned spending, I can’t help but think capturing and permanently storing CO2 can’t, at least, be any more expensive and would save the upheaval and blackouts these unrealistic goals for zero CO2 emissions are – and will cause.
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Have a great and prosperous week.
Hug somebody.
References:
https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/carbon-cycle/
SPIDER Bytes
This week’s trivia question is: What was the codename for the invasion of German-occupied Western Europe on June 6, 1944? The answer to last week’s question re: the globally dreaded disease the World Health Organization declared eradicated in 1980: Smallpox. It was an acute infectious virus/disease that began with a high fever, headache, and back pain and then proceeded to an eruption on the skin that leaves the face and limbs covered with cratered pockmarks, or pox. Smallpox was one of the world’s most-dreaded plagues, killing as many as 30 percent of its victims, most of them children. Those who survived were permanently immune to a second infection, but they faced a lifetime of disfigurement and in some cases blindness. It was a decimating disease for American Indians, delivered by Europeans in the early years of the colonies.
The Fed lowered interest rates by one-half point Wednesday, despite current inflation above its target. The reason is obvious. The Fed is now trying to fend off recession – which coupled with inflation is any economy’s worst nightmare – “stagflation.”
Congress is looking at a “shutdown” October 1 if it does not raise the debt ceiling again. The House ‘Save Act’ tying the requirement that only citizens can vote in national elections to a 6-month extension of spending – failed. Never fear, regardless of all the current and future rhetoric, Congress voted to spend even more money it doesn’t have. So, it has two choices – reduce spending or raise the debt. You get one guess.
The offshore wind industry is already struggling with escalating prices, shaky supply chains, and a handful of highly publicized turbine failures, is also facing a long list of lawsuits seeking to cancel them or tie them up for years in costly litigation. Residents facing the prospect of seeing and hearing those turbines nearby don’t want them.
Meanwhile, environmentalist groups are up in arms re: the Bureau of Land Management’s plan to fast-track permits for solar farms on 31 million acres of the Great Basin and Mojave Desert in western states. Spokesmen for several environmental groups are quoted: “Unlike other extractive use of public lands, constructive solar energy panels cause significant harm to the environment,” and “These projects are enormous in size — a single project is typically 3,000 acres and much of that land will be graded flat for the panels. So, you can expect large-scale land transformation as a result” and “…pristine habitats will be bulldozed, native wildlife will be displaced, groundwater will be consumed and contaminated. The air will be filled with dust while patterns for hydrology and drainage will be altered, perhaps with unanticipated consequences.” This reminds me of my favorite quote: “You can’t do one thing.”
Oil returned and stayed above $70/barrel last week. That of course will be reflected at the pump.
Researchers have identified the genes in barley make it extremely adaptable to different climates, assuring beer and whisky drinkers that a key ingredient of those quaffs will not be affected by ‘climate change.’
