Reef Central Online Community - View Single Post

Tripod1404 · 10/02/2017, 03:20 PM

The issue is, what ever fuel you produce from atmospheric CO2 will return there as long as we use it as fuel. On the bright side, it would prevent more CO2 from being added to the atmosphere, but it can not be done at a rate that would reduce the CO2 levels while still being used as a fuel. That would mean producing more fuel than we are using.

The issue with using algae in vats is; it is more efficient to use land plants. Most land plants are better at fixing CO2 anyways, and they need far less water than any algae. Oceans contribute to 50% of global oxygen production while surrounding 2/3 of the surface. Land plants contribute to the other 50% while only having 1/3 of the total surface.And in actuality some part of that 1/3 is also not usable, such as deserts, tundra and etc.

Currently, it is more efficient to ferment non-edible parts of crop plants into bio-ethanol (such as leaves of maize and rice).

One proposal for removing atmospheric CO2 involves burying all these "non-edible plant" stuff into expired coal mines. A more extreme measure can even be growing forest (ideally a rapidly growing tree), cutting the trees and burying them into coal mines and repeating this over and over again using the same land. That will put carbon out of carbon cycle and reduce CO2 levels. But no one is doing this since it has no economical value.

But keep in mind burning a wood fireplace is more environmentally friendly than a gas fireplace since it atleast produce CO2 from a tree that was part of carbon cycle rather than from natural gas that is made of carbon that was not part of carbon cycle for at least millions of years. With the same logic, if we were to turn all coal power plants into wood burning power plants with artificial forests grown just to supply these, there will be no net CO2 input to the air.

10/02/2017, 03:20 PM	#8
Tripod1404 Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2016 Posts: 1,821	The issue is, what ever fuel you produce from atmospheric CO2 will return there as long as we use it as fuel. On the bright side, it would prevent more CO2 from being added to the atmosphere, but it can not be done at a rate that would reduce the CO2 levels while still being used as a fuel. That would mean producing more fuel than we are using. The issue with using algae in vats is; it is more efficient to use land plants. Most land plants are better at fixing CO2 anyways, and they need far less water than any algae. Oceans contribute to 50% of global oxygen production while surrounding 2/3 of the surface. Land plants contribute to the other 50% while only having 1/3 of the total surface.And in actuality some part of that 1/3 is also not usable, such as deserts, tundra and etc. Currently, it is more efficient to ferment non-edible parts of crop plants into bio-ethanol (such as leaves of maize and rice). One proposal for removing atmospheric CO2 involves burying all these "non-edible plant" stuff into expired coal mines. A more extreme measure can even be growing forest (ideally a rapidly growing tree), cutting the trees and burying them into coal mines and repeating this over and over again using the same land. That will put carbon out of carbon cycle and reduce CO2 levels. But no one is doing this since it has no economical value. But keep in mind burning a wood fireplace is more environmentally friendly than a gas fireplace since it atleast produce CO2 from a tree that was part of carbon cycle rather than from natural gas that is made of carbon that was not part of carbon cycle for at least millions of years. With the same logic, if we were to turn all coal power plants into wood burning power plants with artificial forests grown just to supply these, there will be no net CO2 input to the air.