A Plan to Save the World
In my environment Open Notebook I looked at the idea of sequestering carbon from the atmosphere by dispersing it in the form of elemental carbon (chemically graphite) which is biologically benign and inert on a geological time scale.
The carbon from recently harvested plant material will have been extracted from the atmosphere by photosynthesis.
The Global Environmental Action plan is to pyrolysis this harvested organic material, preferably after it has been used, and turn a proportion of the carbon content into elemental carbon to be dispersed, thus permanently removing it from the atmosphere. The remaining organic content would replace fossil sources for refining into all the organic materials we need.
If the normal economic constraints hold, we would expect this process to make a significant contribution, but only after many decades. What if we could do it much faster?
If this can be done globally sufficiently quickly, it will mean that we can take control of the climate situation, stimulate global cooperation, and see the situation in a mood of hope.
And the world’s crap becomes the new liquid gold.
Supply of harvested organic matter
There would be easily enough to supply the hydrocarbon fuel for longhaul passenger aviation. Ref
Pine tar could be processed in the same way as fossil tar, and the technology is similar to fossil oil refinement
https://www.livescience.com/61966-how-much-you-poop-in-lifetime.html
Food waste: UN,WWF,BBC news 4 mar 2021
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-020-0885-y
The technology
The Pine Tar process shows that it can be done but the efficiency will be low.
Pyrolysers will have a variety of designs depending on the feedstock and the location, urban or rural and state of development. For example:
- To process agricultural waste in a less developed country.
- To process noxious waste in a city with the object of reducing pollution as well as sequestering carbon.
The economics
How soon can the tecnology be developed?
How will it work once it is running?
Promoting this Plan
Watch this space!