Algae key to reducing CO2

Pop quiz, hotshot: what do you know about algae farms?

Algae multiply at top speed, reaching maturity at three days, and they suck up CO2 like a floating rainforest. Also, algae farming may be an eco-friendly carbon offset solution. One football field end zone of algae can produce the equivalent biodiesel of three entire football fields of soybeans.

It’s still barely past the “good idea” stage, but algae farming has a foothold in warmer climates like Australia and the Southern US.

So why not Canada? Well, beyond the restrictive and chilly northern climate, there’s also concern about footprint. The average pond with algae life in it is about 28 cm deep; to mass-cultivate it would require a lot of space. You also have to use the right strains of algae to combat the right kind of pollutants…and there are an estimated 30 to 150 million of them.

Innoventures Canada (I-CAN) wants to find a way to make it work. In order to get past the aforementioned roadblocks, they have come up with three possible solutions:

• Algae Greenhouses. It’s not as efficient as a pond, but some algae-growers use small bags. However, the size and cost of the bags is limiting, so I-CAN is combining these by creating a larger-format closed system, in the form of a covered pond.
• Deeper Ponds. A metre-deep pond takes up less space, but creates issues with light penetration; algae need sunlight. I-CAN is currently exploring lighting options.
• Research. The Alberta Research Council has already been performing research for about two years to find out if this process is even feasible. I-CAN believes it’s worthwhile – if Canada finds the right strains, the information could be sold.

The overarching idea is to create these farms near industrial areas causing CO2 emissions so a symbiotic relationship can ensue. Algae require the CO2 and the warmth generated by industrial facilities, and industry could extend its lifespan.

Even when algae die, it’s still useful.  Its oil can be rendered and removed, and the leftovers are suitable as fertilizer or biofuel. Why didn’t we think to harness this resource sooner?

Spring cleaning for your car

You’ve been reading lots about how to make your home and office more energy-efficient for the summer. But did you stop to consider how you go from one to the other?

Most North Americans drive to work – it’s just the way things are. While we’re generally aware that driving produces greenhouse gas emissions, we’re not as aware that it could be less.

There are those who believe driving faster is actually better for the environment. Their thinking is that by going faster, the car’s engine is running (and thus polluting) for shorter periods of time. Those people are quite, quite wrong.

While different vehicle reaches optimal fuel economy at different speeds, it’s generally accurate to say slower means greener. Fuel efficiency in most cars decreases rapidly at speeds above 96 km/h, or 60 mph.

Anything faster not only burns more fuel, but more money.

Another way to “green” your car is better planning. The average distance driven per person has increased 36 per cent in the past 15 years. This can be greatly diminished by combining trips. Less fuel is expended on one two-stop shopping trip than two single-stop trips – partly because less distance travelled, but also because cold engines burn more fuel.

Many other easily-adjustable factors affect fuel economy. Generally speaking, slow and steady is not only safer, but greener.

By going easy on the brakes and gas pedal, avoiding hard accelerations, reducing time idling and unloading unnecessary items in your trunk to reduce weight, you can burn much less gas, and produce significantly less CO2.

An environmentalist, an oilman, a politician, a journalist and a rock star walk into a bar…

If Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technology was a rock star, just what kind of rock star would it be… a notorious rock star or a renowned rock star? Will CCS be famous for being famous, a feat that often draws sneers from the musical elite, or will it stand the test of time and go down in the books as “the real deal”?

This year, FLOW has been following the CCS debate while the technology continues to make rock star status among industry, major politicians and media in North America. Since we labour under the assumption that the rock star is an apt analogy as the technology deals with underground rock formations, we’d like to explore this question further.

As a preamble, CCS is defined by the Alberta Government as “capturing carbon dioxide emissions from industrial sources and transporting them by pipeline to sites where they are injected into deep rock formations for permanent storage.” CCS technology can also be used for Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) where CO2 is pumped underground and used as a solvent to lessen the viscosity of the oil, allowing it to flow more freely from hard-to-reach places.

In a January FLOW article we explored the different sides of the CCS debate and discovered a range of different attitudes towards CCS that changed markedly from profession to profession. We noticed that environmental groups in particular are hesitant to buy the T-shirt.

“It’s an unproven technology,” said Jeh Custer, Northwestern Energy Campaigner with the Sierra Club. “To think that we’re going to take carbon and put it under the ground and it will be there for hundreds or thousands of years seems overly reliant on technological solutions.”

Industry players, of course, are singing a different tune. And who could blame them? CCS technology represents a means to curb greenhouse gases without cutting down production. It could be used for oil sands, fertilizer production, coal plants, multiple emitters, single emission sources, you name it.

Politicians, as of late, seem to be big fans of CCS. Soon after Barack Obama’s visit with Stephen Harper in February, Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt came to Calgary to announce $140 million in funding going to eight CCS projects in Western Canada. In a March FLOW article, these eight projects represented a microcosm of the greater CCS puzzle in which various facets of the technology are applied in different situations and on a commercial scale. Among Raitt’s glowing reviews of CCS, the Minister said, “I don’t think it’s possible to overstate the importance of this technology… We can’t turn our backs on the energy and the wealth that our fossil fuels generate, but we have the responsibility to make sure it is generated sustainably.”

So judging by environmentalists, we’re dealing with a notorious rock star – famous in an unfavourable light. Judging by politicians and industry players, CCS rocks.

But what about media?

Media have clearly had some mixed views about it. The best way to capture this is through an example of two different media outlets covering the same CCS story.

A paper published in the April 2 issue of journal Nature revealed the findings of a study in which scientists observed nine gas fields that had been naturally filled with carbon dioxide millions of years ago. The study was meant to see how long the natural CO2 had been there. Of course, the crux of the CCS argument is the assumption that CO2, once pumped underground, will stay there forever.

Article A was entitled ‘Greenhouse gases stay buried for millions of years, say scientists’. OK, so far so good. Article B was entitled ‘Nature’s underground carbon stores aren’t rock solid’. Sounds like a pretty mixed bag of attitudes towards our rock star.

While we’re on the topic, we might as well explore what each outlet had to say about the study. The first article suggests the new research may present “the strongest case yet for an emerging technology.” The article briefly mentions CCS skeptics’ concern about its long-term environmental effects, and then outlines the results, saying, “they found the gases have stayed in underground pools of water for eons.” The article also touts the research as “being hailed as the first study to actually show how carbon dioxide is stored in natural-gas fields.”

Article B, on the other hand, essentially demotes the “rock” in our rock star to just a bunch of fizzy water. It means that, since CO2 is more readily absorbed by water than rock, it could eventually leak to the surface as water sometimes does.

Werner Aeschbach-Hertig, Heidelberg University researcher is quoted in the article as saying, “Clearly, mineral trapping is the preferable pathway, as it promises to store the carbon over geological time scales.”

So much for storage.

But maybe we shouldn’t jump to such quick conclusions. If you think about it, the concept of storing natural gas is a proven technology. For decades companies have been pulling natural gas from the ground and putting it back for storage when prices and demand go down. Natural gas is similar to CO2, so who’s to say the same scenario wouldn’t work in a carbon sequestration context?

Granted, Article B does dedicate a few paragraphs to show how these findings do not necessarily mean the end for CCS. “CO2 has been stored in these fields, in some cases, for millions of years,” said the study’s co-author, Sherwood Lollar, in the article. “So obviously, the very fact that it’s dissolved in water doesn’t necessarily mean it’s any less effective a storage mechanism than mineral precipitation.”

So we went from rock to water, but at the end of the day is CCS technology all just a bunch of hot air? This actually leads us to the most important question one should ask if we are going to compare CCS to a rock star. Is it a talented rock star? Meaning, is it good at what it purports to do?

Unfortunately, we can’t answer that question until we give this technology the time, money and resources for research. As far as using CO2 for enhanced oil recovery, this is a known and proven technology, as exemplified by the Weyburn-Midale CO2 Project in southeastern Saskatchewan.

As far as getting the CO2 to sit underground and stay put, there is ample evidence that suggests it can be done but we’ll never truly know unless we try.

And that’s precisely the point for all CCS advocates. Even the rock star could tell you, practice makes perfect.

CCS technology – smaller pieces of Canada’s big green puzzle

While some are still puzzled by carbon capture and storage (CCS), increased funding is allowing industry to test various pieces of the technology in order to get a clearer view of the big, emissions-reducing picture. Various projects underway throughout Alberta, BC and Saskatchewan represent a broad spectrum of CCS applications and, this week, after receiving funding from Natural Resources Canada, eight of them got a little closer to realizing their vision.

On March 26, the Honourable Lisa Raitt, Minister of Natural Resources, came to Alberta to announce a government investment of $140 million towards eight CCS projects chosen out of 39 proposals submitted last year for the $230-million ecoENERGY Technology initiative.

The eight winning proposals were selected to represent an array of different CCS approaches, from CO2 storage in geologic formations to using CO2 in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) projects. According to Raitt, each proposal demonstrated a different, complementary piece in the greater challenge of bringing CCS to wide-scale commercial use.

Understanding the viability of capturing and storing carbon emissions was a particular topic of concern in 2008 when the Alberta government announced it would invest $2 billion toward CCS technology. Concerns ranged from the feasibility of implementing such an expensive technology on a mass scale, to the environmental impacts of burying CO2 without getting to the root of problem and reducing fossil fuel use all together.

“I don’t think it’s possible to overstate the importance of this technology,” said Raitt during Thursday’s announcement at Calgary’s SAIT Polytechnic. “We can’t turn our backs on the energy and the wealth that our fossil fuels generate, but we have the responsibility to make sure it is generated sustainably.”

The investments were also touted as a supporting initiative to Canada’s Economic Action Plan, which will include $2.4 billion worth of new measures to support Canada’s climate change objectives.

“While we’re doing better than a lot of others, we’re certainly not immune,” said Raitt, of Canada’s economy as it compares to the rest of the world. Raitt was forthright in her belief that Canada’s robust fossil fuel sector is largely responsible for Canada’s more salubrious economic position on the global stage.

“Without energy, economies do not grow. They don’t even move… we’re still far from replacing the energy fossil fuels provide [so] we need to find a cleaner way to produce it and consume it.”

Successful proposals were submitted by partnerships led or co-led by ARC Resources, Enhance Energy, Spectra Energy Transmission, TransCanada, TransAlta, Husky, Enbridge and EPCOR. Each of the projects will receive between $3 million and $30 million of federal money, but Raitt stressed the federal funding is only one part of the larger equation. “We need to have collaboration between governments and between government and industry,” Raitt said.

Among the eight winning companies present at the announcement was Alberta’s Enhance Energy Inc. whose project proposes to capture CO2 from a large fertilizer plant as well as an oil sands upgrading operation. The CO2 would then be transported and injected into mature oil reservoirs in central Alberta for EOR and permanent sequestration.

“The funding will allow us to accelerate implementation of the project,” explained company president and engineer Susan Cole, adding that the Alberta Industrial Heartland based project, has been in the working for four years. “The added financial support will allow the company to bring this initiative to commercialization faster,” said Cole. (diagram above: Enhance Energy)

To date, the most notable example of CO2 being used for EOR, is Saskatchwan’s Weyburn-Midale CO2 project in southeastern Saskatchewan, which is home to a depleted oil reservoir containing deep underground rock formations called saline aquifers. Transported via pipeline from a plant in Beulah North Dakota, pure streams of CO2 left over from the coal gasification process are injected into these underground formations to increase the recovery rates of sticky, stubborn oil in hard to reach places.

So how does Enhance Energy’s project complement projects already using CO2 for EOR? According to Cole, it will demonstrate the feasibility of a single network to collect CO2 from a large number of industrial emitters. It is projected that within five years, this project could capture and sequester up to 1.9 megatonnes of CO2 annually, equal to taking 358,000 cars off the road each year.

“Each of the projects really is quite different,” said Doug Bloom, President of Spectra Energy Transmission West. The company’s Fort Nelson, B.C. project presents yet another challenge of CCS technology – testing the injection of sour CO2 into these deep saline formations for permanent storage. “In our case, we’re a natural gas pipeline. Raw natural gas contains high levels of CO2 and sulphur dioxide and we want to test the feasibility of permanently storing it in deep underground formations.”

As various parts of the CCS puzzle come into sharper focus, industry and governments across the world remain aware that the technology represents only one part of the even larger puzzle of environmental sustainability. As one environmentalist said in an earlier FLOW article about CCS technology, “there is no one green bullet.”

When asked by one reporter if Canada has a “plan B” for meeting reduction targets, Raitt replied that she doesn’t view CCS support in terms of a plan A or a plan B, calling it a scientifically viable solution in fossil fuel emissions mitigation. “We’re well on our way,” said Raitt adding that the ecoENERGY Technology initiative includes funding research on renewable energy and energy efficiency.

The funding announcement also coincided with the province of Alberta being recognized for its great strides in CCS research by The Aspen Institute, a U.S. energy and environment organization. The Aspen Institute awards recognize organizations for excellence in innovation, implementation and communication of energy and environmental solutions.

Capturing the CCS debate

In 2008, Carbon Sequestration and Storage (CCS) became a bigger topic around the water cooler; for industry people, scientists, media, and Canadians at large. After the Alberta government’s official endorsement of the technology earlier in the year and subsequent pledge of $2 billion to advance CCS research over the summer, this was the year CCS moved into the mainstream.

The Alberta funding is part of that province’s climate change plan, which was launched by Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach in early 2008. The plan aims to cut GHG emissions in the province in half by 2050. CCS technology is expected to contribute to 70 per cent of the total 200 megatonnes slated for reduction by that time.

Even the federal government seemed keen on pushing CCS with Harper’s $240 million funding announcement for what they are describing as “the world’s first and largest CCS demonstration projects at the Boundary Dam Power Station in Estevan Saskatchewan.

Climate change solution or just a bunch of hot air?

Everyone seems to have a perspective on CCS – whether they’re members of industry investing in its development, or NGOs that are intrinsically wary of industry and government touted solutions.

Environmental groups in particular often regard CCS as an unknown technology and are hesitant to jump on the bandwagon. The Sierra Club is a case in point. To find the organization’s views, one need look no further than their Coal FAQs: “If coal is to remain a part of our energy future, it must be mined responsibly, burned cleanly and guaranteed to not worsen global warming pollution. At this time, there is no existing coal technology that meets these standards, including Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) or carbon capture and sequestration (CCS).”

The Pembina Institute, on the other hand, is cautiously supportive of CCS. “There is no one green bullet,” says executive director Marlo Raynolds who believes CCS should be employed as part of a “portfolio” of climate change solutions. Raynolds says that Pembina has taken on the stance that, because Alberta is situated on sedimentary basins, oil sands operate on a geology that lends itself well to CO2 storage. “If we were in other parts of the world where we didn’t have that storage capacity, we would need to look for other options. For us CCS is one part of the solution.”

Percolating the debate even further is the presence of online forums in which citizens of all walks share their knowledge, questions and opinions about CCS. One such debate was fomented on the Canada’s Oil Sands website, which was launched early in the summer to provide a platform for people to air their concerns about oil sand development. The industry funded initiative, dubbed “a different conversation” saw the introduction of many discussion topics, and it wasn’t long before CCS was added to the mix.

“If you look at the hydrocarbons – oil, gas, bitumen and for that matter coal, they are essentially sequestered carbon, only carbon that was sequestered millions of years ago,” writes one contributor under the alias ‘Bill.’ “I think it is perfectly logical option to ‘resequester’ this same carbon in depleted oil and gas reservoirs where it once was sequestered. It would be sequestered as CO2 rather than as CH4 or other hydrocarbons. We have simply extracted the energy from it.”

The discussion on the site ranges from potential ground water impact to individual responsibility for reduction of emissions.

CCS in depth

Another voice in the debate is that of CCS advocate Dr. Eddy Isaac, Executive Director of Alberta Energy Research Institute (AERI). While Isaac agrees with some concerns being raised – primarily the high cost required to test and implement – he regards CCS as a known technology with potential to address the emissions issue. Referring to the often cited challenge of transporting and storing the collected CO2, Isaac says it’s been happening everyday in the US for the last 30 years.

Already in a natural liquid state, companies have been pumping and transporting natural C02 from the ground as a solvent for enhanced oil recovery. A good example of this is the Weyburn-Midale CO2 Project in southeastern Saskatchewan which is home to a depleted oil reservoir containing deep underground rock formations called saline aquifiers. Transported via pipeline from a plant in Beulah North Dakota, pure streams of CO2 left over from the coal gasification process is injected into these underground formations for EOR. “The real challenge right now is being able to capture emitted CO2,” explains Isaac, adding the technology does exist, but is highly expensive to implement on the mass scale required to substantively reduce emissions. 

Another component in the equation is storage. Isaac says this is being done already, albeit on a smaller scale, as acid gas from gas plants containing a mixture of CO2 and hydrogen sulphide is regularly stored in what’s called, saline formations. According to Isaac, there are 50 projects currently underway that involve injecting acid gas into these formations, but bringing the technology into mass commercial use involves major costs that should eventually start decreasing. “We’re going a step further and saying in the long run we need to find other formations to put the CO2 in – yes we can use it for enhanced oil recovery, but in the long run we want to also just inject it and forget about it.”

But perhaps it’s not that simple. Recent research points out the energy intensive process of operating CCS technology, suggesting a new metaphor for the technology might be in order – the Ouroboros, more widely recognized as a snake eating its own tale. It is a representation of infinity or, less inspiring, the impossible or self-defeating. A recent study reveals the possibility that CCS could result in increased emissions, due to the additional energy required to power the very process that was supposed to reduce air pollution in the first place.

Says Science News, “When the researchers factored in all the “cradle to grave” pollution of a CO2-burying plant, emissions of acid rain-causing gases like nitrogen oxides (NOx) and sulfur oxides (SOx) were up to 40 percent greater than the total cradle-to-grave emissions of a modern plant that doesn’t capture its CO2.”

Advocates of the technology, such as Isaac, believe this isn’t necessarily the case. “The technologies used in new power plants that will capture CO2 will be based on gasification technology or Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC),” he says, adding that although plants using IGCC technology are expensive and seldom used today, the technology is suited, in many respects, to bringing emissions down to zero. “The use of this technology reduces SOx and NOx by orders of magnitude compared to conventional pulverized coal technology. So while I believe we need to do life cycle analyses, all the data I have seen indicate much lower SOx and NOx emissions.”

Another solution for the CCS energy use conundrum comes from Stephen Kaufman, Chairman of the Integrated CO2 Network (ICO2N) an industry supported carbon capture and storage (CCS) system proposed for Canada. “By undertaking CO2 capture there is a loss in plant efficiency and more energy is required for the same output,” says Kaufman. “The CO2 emissions from this additional energy use will also be captured in the majority of cases”

CCS – a question of politics

While the challenges and solutions for CCS continue being posed, the debate also veers into political territory. Should the high cost to implement CCS become the responsibility of industry or taxpayers? Such is a topic experts from all representations seem to have an opinion about as well.

“It’s subsidizing industry through taxpayer dollars. We end up paying to clean up industry’s mess.” says Jeh Custer, Northwestern Energy Campaigner with the Sierra Club. Describing the announcement as industry’s “get out of jail free card” Custer says the technology ultimately allows them to continue business as usual. “It’s an unproven technology. To think that we’re going to take carbon and put it under the ground and it will be there for hundreds or thousands of years seems over reliant on technological solutions.”

Kaufman, on the other hand, says that research from ICO2N shows large-scale CCS will not proceed if left to the market alone as the investment risks in the early years are substantial. “CCS is ideal for a public-private partnership as this approach enables industry and, both provincial and federal, government to work together to address long-term policy, financial risk-sharing and regulatory issues,” says the chairman.

“Carbon sequestration is still a relatively new and expensive process,” says Jacob Irving, Executive Director of the Oil Sands Developers Group, adding that developing the Alberta oil sands was also expensive in the beginning. But as time passed and technology advanced, the cost to develop decreased substantially. “We expect the same would be true for carbon sequestration technology but only through the construction and generation of actual projects. And that can only happen with the ongoing efforts and investment of industry alongside the support of government through initiatives such as the recently announced CCS fund.”

Meanwhile, the wheels are already steering the CCS debate from the realm of talk and into the realm of action. The Alberta Government recently announced three Alberta test wells are slated for drilling in a “ground-breaking, long-term, large-volume CO2 sequestration project,” that will reach the end of the field test phase in June 2010. As well, with $2 billion flowing up the provincial pipes, many industry players and scientists are excited by the chance to push the technology so it can be brought to mass-scale commercial use. AERI, the organization responsible for fielding applications has been short-listing those proposals that demonstrate high potential for speed of development and ability to substantively reduce GHGs through CCS technology. Full project proposals will be submitted by early 2009 and the specific allocation of monies from the $2 billion CCS fund will be determined by March 31, 2009.

At that point, expect a little more conversation at the water cooler about CCS.

Hot off the press – and in the air

Befitting its status as our energy engine, Alberta continues to account for the country’s largest output of greenhouse gases (GHG). The latest numbers, courtesy of Statistics Canada and Environment Canada, show Alberta was responsible for 114,408,432 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) in 2007.

Tallied up from 106 facilities required to report GHGs under the auspices of the federal Facility Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reporting Program, Alberta’s output represented 41% of the country’s overall total of 278,093,770 tonnes emitted by 350 facilities. That was statistically in line with Canada’s annual output since 2003 as most jurisdictions showed no significant change over the four years covered in the latest summary. However, Alberta and Saskatchewan emissions were up, mainly due to an increased number of facilities supplying data.

However, the dubious distinction of being the largest single-point source of GHGs in 2007 went to Ontario Hydro’s coal-fired Nanticoke generating station on the shore of Lake Erie — 17,887,649 tonnes of CO2e, which was mostly CO2 with lesser amounts of methane (NH4) and nitrous oxide (NO2).

As usual, expressed in tonnes of CO2e, the latest year’s total was dominated by 262,733,182 tonnes of CO2, 8,355,805 of CH4, 4,337,760 of N20, 30,739 of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), 2,301,959 of perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and 344,325 of sulphur hexafluoride (SF6).

Ontario reported the second-highest CO2e total in 2007, 73,910,625 tonnes with the other jurisdictions tonnages as follows: Quebec, 23,373,453; Saskatchewan, 22,929,832; British Columbia, 12,702,944; Nova Scotia, 11,414,536; New Brunswick, 10,902,038; Newfoundland & Labrador, 5,427,219; Manitoba, 2,401,753; Northwest Territories, 520,970; and Prince Edward Island, 101,967.

Although Alberta emitted the most CO2, Ontario was responsible for the greatest amounts of CH4, N20, HFCs AND SF6 while Quebec topped the PFC hit list.

While Nanticoke topped the single-point source rankings, Syncrude Canada’s Mildred Lake and Aurora North plants in Fort McMurray, Alta. were in second place with a combined 14,936,539 tonnes, and Epcor Power Generation’s coal-fired Genesee plant in Warburg, Alta. was third at 9,481,997 tonnes.

The utilities sector, No. 21 as defined by the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code, accounted for 44% of the 2007 GHG output in Canada compared with 35% by the manufacturing sector (NAICS 31-33), 20% by the mining, quarrying and oil and gas extraction sector (NAICS 21) and the remaining 5% by a variety of smaller sources.

Within NAICS 21, oil and gas extraction companies as a subsector accounted for 89%, metal ore mining for six per cent, coal mining for 3% and non-metallic mining and quarrying for 2%. 

The full report is available at Environment Canada.

Save some for the rest of us!

Ask anyone who’s tried to predict the vagaries of a changing climate and you’ll get the same response: climate models are tricky. From the greenhouse gas-chomping habits of the atmosphere, trees and our water to the usual problems of predicting any kind of weather pattern, the collective effect is a climate wrapped in an enigma.

And frankly, the muskoxen aren’t helping matters.

Research from Penn State suggests that one long-held assumption about climate change, namely that a warmer climate will lead to the growth of CO2-consuming shrubbery, might actually be mitigated by grazing muskoxen. Literally eating up the gains in the plants’ growth, as much as 19 per cent on average and 46 per cent in the case of the dwarf birch, these four-legged belching machines will not only be consuming the possible benefits of more plant life, but also adding to greenhouse gas emissions like their domesticated cousins.

With plant life capable of absorbing greenhouse gas being eaten by ruminants responsible for producing the same, it seems like a net loss for the planet, with hungry muskoxen sending us closer and closer to an overheated planet. Then again, if there’s anything to be taken from the complicated effects of crowing shrubs and hungry quadrupeds, it’s that with climate change you never really can be sure.

Where did it go, George?

Carbon dioxide is about as elusive an adversary as they come — it’s invisible, belched out by the tonne every day in a variety of industries and everyday activities as well as being one of the greenhouse gases responsible for slowly warming the planet. It’s also an important measurement for greenhouse gas emissions, with one tonne of CO2 representing one unit of “global warming potential” (GWP).

So, as governments around the world design ways to trap it or pay for it, the question remains: where is it all going (aside from the atmosphere, that is)?

The answers range from trees to man-made sequestration projects, but not all are confined to dry land. Here, then, are a few particularly moist places that CO2 has been hiding in our planet.

Wetlands

These soggy, much-maligned swamps may be breeding grounds for mosquitoes and real estate scams, but they’re also repositories for as much as 20 per cent of the world’s carbon. Ironically, increasing global temperatures may add another layer to the same problem by drying out these wetlands, releasing their stored CO2.

The revelation that wetlands hold large volumes of carbon isn’t necessarily fresh news, with a study from the University of Missouri having found that submerged trees retain carbon better than their dryer counterparts.

The Amazon

If wetlands are gigantic puddles, then The Amazon River, the largest river in the world, is certainly no drip. “Drawing down” large quantities of atmospheric CO2, the point at which the river meets the Atlantic Ocean acts as a massive “carbon sink,” with micro-organisms called diazotrophs processing CO2 and nitrogen into a solid form that sinks to ocean floor.

According to a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), though polar seas are more likely to dissolve the gas, “warm oceans may be where a permanent carbon sink is more likely.”

The Ocean

With billions of litres of water flowing from the Amazon into the sea, the world’s oceans take their turn with the absorption of CO2 . Though models predicting the exact nature of the oceans’ relationship to greenhouse gases is still being mapped out, what’s clear is that the waters making up most of the Earth’s surface have an enormous capacity for absorbing our emissions.

Simply dumping CO2 into the ocean is no solution to the greenhouse gas dilemma, however. Given the potential for a new balance of CO2 to either acidify the ocean or simply rebalance the concentrations in the atmosphere and ocean , any technology designed to lock CO2 in the ocean needs to demonstrate that it can be contained permanently.

After all, with an adversary this difficult to spot, it’s nice to keep it in where we can find it.

Seeing the forest for the robo-trees

Canada’s mighty boreal forests have had their chance, now it’s time for robo-trees.

Dr. Wallace Broecker, the man who coined the phrase “global warming,” has been making the rounds with a proposal to actively harvest CO2 from the atmosphere using technology modeled after nature’s original CO2 harvester.

He argues that the current global hodgepodge of emissions restrictions and alternative energy sources, coupled with the increasing energy consumption of the developing world, won’t be enough for meaningful change. Given this, he proposes active CO2 reductions as a way of acknowledging and combating the world’s continued dependence on cheap fossil fuels.

His weapon of choice would be legions of artificial trees or “CO2 scrubbers,” 17 million in the US alone, each standing about 50 feet high and costing billions of dollars. And though the technology is still theoretical, Global Research Technologies, for whom Dr. Broecker works as an unpaid advisor, is taking a close look at this technology.

The harvesters, which would filter and retain CO2 as the air carried the gas onto its collector surfaces, would be able to transport the greenhouse gas to storage facilities. While Dr. Broecker advocates underground storage, the Global Research Technologies web site also includes potential uses for the captured gas such as “controlled environment agriculture” (greenhouses) and growing algae as a source for biofuel.

As a selling point, salable CO2 adds the essential answer to “what’s in it for me?” However, it also draws attention to an important point: Broecker himself concedes that the billions of dollars required to install the artificial trees around the world is, at least for now, a prohibitive condition. Where forests cost nothing to grow, notwithstanding the costs of preserving them, robo-trees will need to be fertilized by cold, hard cash.