Growing and burying algae in the Sahara is the latest solution for the climate crisis

CNN ^ | August 18, 2023 | By Thomas Page, CNN

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Out in the Sahara Desert, in one of the most inhospitable environments imaginable, a natural solution to the climate crisis is growing ­– and at a rapid rate.

London-based startup Brilliant Planet has leased 6,100 hectares of land outside the remote coastal town of Akhfenir in southern Morocco, wedged between the Atlantic Ocean to the north and the Sahara to the south. And it’s using it to cultivate algae.

Algae absorbs atmospheric carbon dioxide and emits oxygen via photosynthesis, and has been doing so since before the first land plants ever existed. Brilliant Planet’s CEO Adam Taylor says the company has developed a way to grow algae at exponential rates starting in a beaker in a lab and ending in 12,000-square-meter pools of locally-sourced seawater. Taylor says the process mimics a natural algae bloom, and a test tube of algae can multiply to fill 16 of these giant pools – the equivalent of 77 Olympic-sized swimming pools – in just 30 days.

The algae is extracted from the water then pumped up a 10-story tower and sprayed into the desert air. In the roughly 30 seconds it takes to reach the ground, hot air dries the biomass out, leaving hypersaline algae flakes which can be collected and shallow buried, sequestering their carbon for thousands of years, the company claims.

“Nature-based solutions are a great way of removing carbon,” Taylor told CNN, arguing that deserts are an under-utilized environment.

“It does not cost a lot of money to rent the desert (and) governments are enthusiastic to have any economic activity,” he continued.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

[Jonty30]

So burying plant stock will not have an plants?

[EEGator]

This is how SciFi dystopian novels start.

Later “unforeseen…cascading…we then tried…zombies…”

[PIF]

“Nature-based solutions are a great way of removing carbon,”
—
If only there were some other way ... hummm. Plants?

[hardspunned]

“Nature-based solutions are a great way of fleecing tax dollars from hard working people.”

[Vermont Lt]

Is high saline plant content good for anything…but bar snacks?

[BenLurkin]

What climate crisis?

[struggle]

Why not just plant a bunch of trees?

[teeman8r]

so we extract algae from the ocean, grow it in seawater we extract from the ocean, let it pull carbon from the atmosphere, then harvest it and dry it in the dry desert air to bury it in a shallow grave to store carbon for thousands of years.

all things algae would do naturally in the seawater to begin with... sheesh, these guys are killing it.

[unixfox]

Why not just plant a bunch of trees?

And a sprinkler system.

[alloysteel]

We can do much better to cure the desert climate on the Northern Sahara.

Set up Small Modular nuclear reactors near the seashore, and use the heat generated by the reactor to distill sea water, collect the resulting water vapor in cooling condensation towers, and pipe the pure and mineral-free water eastward into the arid lands of the the desert. The desert will begin to bloom, and as the number and locations of the nuclear-powered seawater stills are increased, the volume of water being pumped eastward across the desert continues to expand the arable land, eventually reaching Egypt and the Nile River. An enormous green belt is thus established across territory that once served as the bread basket of the Roman Empire, and for a while, the specter of starvation is once again staved off.

There is an awful lot of Sahara desert to be turned back into a green belt, and the resulting change would be overall highly beneficial to mankind, but it may conflict with those for whom an economic model built around scarcity rather than abundance, is their personal path to power and influence.

[Rlsau1]

This sounds like some scheme which runs off grants from some source with much of the money flowing back into certain pockets. The left has innumerable money laundering schemes to fund themselves in their efforts to take over and control everything, and it’s always with OPM (other peoples’ money).

[chopperk]

Just another boondoggle plan to get free money to do nothing.

[imabadboy99]

global warming really is their religion. They are worshipping creation instead of the Creator. Sick stuff.

[imabadboy99]

The sahara has served as a nice deterrent to northern immigration of sub-saharans. I see no reason to change it.

[Eccl 10:2]

“Why not just plant a bunch of trees?

And a sprinkler system.”

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Use solar panels for energy to salinize water and pump it into desert-located tree farms. Start small, prove the concept, then start scaling up.

Lather, rinse, repeat in any suitable locations.

Alternatively, the water could be used to build up grasslands. Livestock eat the grass, and replenish the soil with their excrement. This has been proven to work.

[ConservativeInPA]

My yard has green stuff in it, much more significant than algae. Some of the green stuff reaches 5-inches in height in several days due to the wet summer we’re having. Other green stuff is consistently above 50 feet tall and even other green stuff varies in height of 3.5 to 5 feet. Then I have a plot of green stuff that produces edible green, red, orange, and yellow stuff that I eat.

I am going to patent and trademark my GreenStuff ^™, give my self a fancy title and hire a retarded Swedish teenage spokesgirl to be beg government for funding so I can save the planet.

[sauropod]

Yep.

[muir_redwoods]

There are no good solutions to a non-existent problem. If 30 million head of cattle pose a threat to the planet how did it handle 60 million bison?

[Worldtraveler once upon a time]

CNN is playing the "product placement" game with another small company. Of the company, cursory research says it, as an investment, is failing. Ergo, publicity!

" As far as price, Taylor is coy: 'I anticipate a great position for us in the US$50-$100/ton high quality credit market.' This would significantly undercut current operations like Switzerland's Climeworks, which, last we checked, was costing between US$600-$1,000 per ton in 2021 and shooting for closer to US$250/ton by 2025."

Om "Brilliant Planet plans cheap, gigaton-scale carbon capture using algae" New Atlas, Loz Blain, April 26, 2022

"Brilliant Planet has raised a total of $26.7M in funding over 4 rounds. Their latest funding was raised on Apr 6, 2022 from a Series A round."

Source: https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/brilliant-planet

Those four "rounds" occurred over seven years.
$12,000,000 -- Apr 6, 2022
$6,500,000 -- Jan 1, 2019
$4,200,000 -- Jan 1, 2017
$4,000,000 -- Jan 1, 2018

The "$12 million Series A funding co-led by Union Square Ventures and Toyota Ventures"

Source: https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/brilliant-planet-limited-announces-the-closing-of-its-12-million-series-a-funding-co-led-by-union-square-ventures-and-toyota-ventures-1031337005

As a listed company, their current stock price is $3.41. From a high of $18.49 in 7 November 2021, the price has dropped significantly. This suggests in part the current news is....

M A R K E T I N G

This and many similar projects (scams) seem to be counting on the "carbon credit market," which is no market at all, but a seller of pieces of "feel good" paper.

If you had bought shares at $18.49 less than two years ago, your current loss would be -$15.06 a share.

If you had bought "carbon credits," you would have nothing over time, as multiple "carbon credit" trading schemes have lasted a few years and then folded. These "voluntary markets" have an interesting history. Such as the Chicago Climate Exchange.

"CCX ceased trading carbon credits at the end of 2010 due to inactivity in the U.S. carbon markets...."

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Climate_Exchange