A new way to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere

[hermetic]

The new process, developed by researchers at MIT, can remove greenhouse gases regardless of concentration levels — a critical breakthrough since greenhouses gases in our atmosphere stand at 400 parts per million, a level that isn't considered sustainable.

As described in a new research paper in the journal Energy and Environmental Science, the technique passes air through electrochemical plates. Those stacked plates essentially absorb the CO2 as air flows through them — a filtration system capturing even the finest particles found in the air we breathe.

/snip

The MIT team touts the new model as flexible, scalable and cheap, mostly due to its relatively simple design.

"All of this is at ambient conditions — there's no need for thermal, pressure, or chemical input. It's just these very thin sheets, with both surfaces active, that can be stacked in a box and connected to a source of electricity," notes team member Sahag Voskian in a news release.

https://www.mnn.com/green-tech/research-innovations/stories/co2-carbon-dioxide-process-removal

This is great news! Wanna bet Dolt45 immediately writes a directive banning its use and further studies.

[IndyOp]

1. How quickly can we scale up for how much $. How much can it absorb?

Rain in Amazon forest slowing - lungs of the planet could stop breathing within two years.

[Boomer]

2. It's not a solution yet

If you read the article, you'll see that this invention only addresses the extraction of CO2 from the air, but not what to do with it once it's been pulled out of the air. Notice the "indirectly contribute to greenhouse gas reduction."

>>The CO2 collected during the process could also be useful, and indirectly, contribute to greenhouse gas reduction... pure carbon dioxide can be compressed and disposed of underground. Or, they suggest, it can be turned into fuel.<<

We need the "And then..." filled in concretely before popping any champagne corks.

[IndyOp]

3. Yep. (nt)

[Mickju]

6. I was wondering about that.

[Duppers]

4. We'll need BILLIONS of these huge filters.

Will this be funded any time soon by a party who'll remain in denial?

Glad to know there's some hope! Thanks for posting, hermetic.

[Boomer]

5. This is NOT ready-for-prime-time technology yet

If you read the article you'll see that this is only the front porch of a house that hasn't been built yet. There's no developed plan for what to do with the CO2 that is captured. In fact, the article is incredibly vague about what to do with stuff, other than put fizz in your sodas. Fizzy sodas just delay the release of the carbon you captured, the only savings is in the energy it currently takes to makes sodas fizzy. Not all that much to celebrate there.

When we have a financially viable technology for sequestering that carbon, one that scales, THEN we can pull that hope thang out for some fresh air. We're not there yet.

[The_jackalope]

7. Like all other CO2 extraction technologies, this one is defeated by the scale of the problem

Just to keep CO2 concentrations level, we would need to capture and store ~35 billion tonnes of CO2 every year. Then we would need to increase that capture/storage rate to reduce the concentration over time.

We could address part of the problem by reducing global emission rates, but the only times that has happened in the last 50 years was in the early 1980s, and in 2008 - both times due to massive world economic problems. I don't propose that as a solution, however. I don't think electric cars or wind and solar are going to do the job, but hey I've been wrong before. Luckily, however, this is a self-limiting problem. As civilization crashes, so does human activity. And the energy required to drive it, and the CO2 waste from that energy production.

And no, we won't stop using fossil fuels before TSHTF..

[Boomer]

8. There's a grim outcome baked into that scenario

We are locked into fossil fuels and despite the catastrophic consequences we won't give them up because no other fuel source can sustain the current financial systems, infrastructure and populations of industrial nations. Which means that when nations collapse (when, not if), millions of people will die. There is no way to sustain this density of population with other technologies, not yet (if ever) and certainly not within the next 30-40 years.

If we had 200 years to prepare.... we wouldn't feel any sense of urgency and we'd still put it off until it was too late.