Putting the carbon back: Black is the new green

Nature ^ | 9 August 2006 | Emma Marris

[Wonder Warthog]

"The particles of char produced this way are somehow able to gather up nutrients and water that might otherwise be washed down below the reach of roots."

"Somehow???" These guys need to read up on "activated charcoal". I'm sure that a similar phenomenon is involved.

[Popocatapetl]

Rule of thumb: Any environmental plan that involves wasting a resource is a bad idea.

Carbon dioxide is a valuable resource. Instead of throwing it away, it should be used to both make money and reduce overall energy use and reduce total waste atmospheric CO2.

An MIT professor found the best of several algaes that convert water, sunlight and CO2 into high grade biodiesel and a lesser quantity of ethanol. Even in the weak sun of Massachusetts it produced copious amounts of these fuels. It is a far more efficient process than using plant biomass.

By putting their waste CO2 through inexpensive on-site algae farms, industry can turn waste product into profit.

It saves all the energy needed to grow plant biomass crops; it slashes industrial waste CO2; it "recycles" the carbon into biodiesel and ethanol, which are easy to transport in quantity; its water can be recycled; and the processed dry algae can be used for animal fodder.

So once again, do not accept the notion of wasting a resource as a solution to a problem.

[PeterPrinciple]

One of the people with whom I often work made an 1800% ROI on a company producing solar panels. You can make a lot of green with green.


I can also make a lot of money at the race track or with a lottery ticket. Don't confuse luck with good decision making.

[Wonder Warthog]

"Then there are your risk-averse farmers. They haven't heard of char. And they aren't going to buy it — let alone buy a strangely named machine to make it — unless they know it will make them money. It is no good pitching it to them with a mouthful of scientific caveats about not knowing the right kind of char for each type of soil or exactly how it works."

This dumbass obviously knows little or nothing about farmers. They are some of the most scientifically oriented and forward-looking entrepreneurs to be found in the country. You show them a way to drastically improve soil fertility and productivity, and they'll be all over it.

[Moonman62]

Notice I said possible global warming. CO2 concentration is increasing, though. There is no controversy about that.

[Yo-Yo]

I've replied to the Water Vapour talking point so often now, that I will just suggest you look around for my comments on it.

I just read some of your replies, and most of them say "I've written about Water Vapo(u)r so often now..." so would you like to point me to one of your missives that states your position?

Most of the time the argument I hear is "well, yes water vapor is 95% of the greenhouse effect, and manmade sources of CO₂ is less than 0.3% of overall greenouse effect, but that 0.3% just might be enough to tip the scales into runaway global warming."

Those are the same people who ignore a 0.2% increase in solar output as "insignificant." (Whoops, I almost said Mars was warming, too.)

[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 8/17/2006. Thanks Einigkeit_Recht_Freiheit.

[1010RD]

Let’s just keep burning our coal using clean coal technology. The world will do just fine.

[1010RD]

You’re wrong about this: It is not contradictory to conservative ideology to state that the earth is a finite planet with limited resources.

Conservatives know that there is no such thing as a ‘natural resource’ and that free marketplaces and human minds will solve problems. That’s our route.

Have you read Julian Simon’s writings?

http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/5.02/ffsimon_pr.html

http://www.juliansimon.com/

http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/01/13/but-why-did-julian-simon-win-the-paul-ehrlich-bet/

Are you aware of the disastrous results of mega-projects nearly without exception?

http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2015/05/bent_flyvbjerg.html

More importantly is that the estimated potential rise in temperature spans a broad range. For the vast majority of that range ‘global warming’ doesn’t cause catastrophic harm. What’s the problem?

[bert]

the ultimate char apparatus will use solar concentrators to provide the intense focused heat required to produce the smolder on a continuous conveyor powered by electric motors run on current from a wind generator