IASNOVA
Carbon Sequestration
Carbon sequestration or carbon dioxide removal (CDR) is the long-term removal, capture or sequestration of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to slow or reverse atmospheric CO2 pollution and to mitigate or reverse global warming.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) is naturally captured from the atmosphere through biological, chemical, and physical processes.These changes can be accelerated through changes in land use and agricultural practices, such as converting crop and livestock grazing land into land for non-crop fast growing plants.Artificial processes have been devised to produce similar effects,including large-scale, artificial capture and sequestration of industrially produced CO2 using subsurface saline aquifers, reservoirs, ocean water, aging oil fields, or other carbon sinks, bio-energy with carbon capture and storage, biochar, ocean fertilization, enhanced weathering, and direct air capture when combined with storage.
Geological Sequestration
Geological sequestration refers to the storage of CO2 underground in depleted oil and gas reservoirs, saline formations, or deep, un-minable coal beds.
Chemical Scrubbers
Various carbon dioxide scrubbing processes have been proposed to remove CO
2 from the air, usually using a variant of the Kraft process. Carbon dioxide scrubbing variants exist based on potassium carbonate, which can be used to create liquid fuels, or on sodium hydroxide.These notably include artificial trees proposed by Klaus Lackner to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere using chemical scrubbers.
Carbon Sinks
A carbon sink is any natural reservoir that absorbs more carbon than it releases, and thereby lowers the concentration of CO
2 from the atmosphere. Globally, the two most important carbon sinks are vegetation and the ocean.
Biochar
It is charcoal used as a soil amendment for both carbon sequestration and soil health benefits. Biochar is a stable solid, rich in carbon, and can endure in soil for thousands of years.Like most charcoal, biochar is made from biomass via pyrolysis. Biochar is under investigation as a viable approach for carbon sequestration, as it has the potential to help mitigate global warming and climate change. It results from processes related to pyrogenic carbon capture and storage.
Ocean Fertlisation
Ocean fertilization or ocean nourishment is a type of climate engineering based on the purposeful introduction of nutrients to the upper ocean to increase marine food production and to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. A number of techniques, including fertilization by iron, urea and phosphorus have been proposed.
Ocean iron fertilization is an example of such a geoengineering technique. Iron fertilization attempts to encourage phytoplankton growth, which removes carbon from the atmosphere for at least a period of time.This technique is controversial due to limited understanding of its complete effects on the marine ecosystem,including side effects and possibly large deviations from expected behavior. Such effects potentially include release of nitrogen oxides, and disruption of the ocean’s nutrient balance.
Seaweed Farming
Seaweed grows very fast and can theoretically be harvested and processed to generate biomethane, via Anaerobic Digestion to generate electricity, via Cogeneration/CHP or as a replacement for natural gas. One study suggested that if seaweed farms covered 9% of the ocean they could produce enough biomethane to supply Earth’s equivalent demand for fossil fuel energy, remove 53 gigatonnes of CO2 per year from the atmosphere and sustainably produce 200 kg per year of fish, per person, for 10 billion people.Ideal species for such farming and conversion include Laminaria digitata, Fucus serratus and Saccharina latissima.
Carbon Farming
Carbon farming is a name for a variety of agricultural methods aimed at sequestering atmospheric carbon into the soil and in crop roots, wood and leaves. Increasing soil’s carbon content can aid plant growth, increase soil organic matter (improving agricultural yield), improve soil water retention capacity and reduce fertilizer use (and the accompanying emissions of greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N2O).
Biosequestration
Biosequestration is the capture and storage of the atmospheric greenhouse gas carbon dioxide by continual or enhanced biological processes.
This form of carbon sequestration occurs through increased rates of photosynthesis via land-use practices such as reforestation, sustainable forest management, and genetic engineering. Methods and practices exist to enhance soil carbon sequestration in both sectors of agriculture and forestry. Additionally, in the context of industrial energy production, strategies such as Bio-energy with Carbon Capture and Storage to absorb carbon dioxide emissions from coal, petroleum, or natural gas-fired electricity generation can utilize an alternative of algal bio sequestration.
Ocean Acidification
Ocean acidification is the ongoing decrease in the pH of the Earth’s oceans, caused by the uptake of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere. Seawater is slightly basic (meaning pH > 7), and ocean acidification involves a shift towards pH-neutral conditions rather than a transition to acidic conditions (pH < 7). An estimated 30–40% of the carbon dioxide from human activity released into the atmosphere dissolves into oceans, rivers and lakes. Some of it reacts with the water to form carbonic acid. Some of the resulting carbonic acid molecules dissociate into a bicarbonate ion and a hydrogen ion, thus increasing ocean acidity (H+ ion concentration).
