2023-04-22 15:09:25
Capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) in the air. To get out of the climate crisis, we will now have to go through this, say the researchers. Which doesn’t mean that we can… content ourselves with that!
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Last year, Silicon Valley invested some $50 billion in so-called climate technologies. More specifically, the initiative Frontier aims to rapidly inject nearly one billion dollars into technologies for capturing carbon dioxide (CO2). All over the world, projects are developing around the issue of carbon capture and storage, CCS, as the experts say. Just last week, researchers from Lehigh University (United States) presented a new solution. A polymer filter capable of converting CO2 captured directly from the air into sodium bicarbonate which can then be released into the oceans.
According to the researchers, the use of such a hybrid material would increase the efficiency of carbon capture by 300% compared to existing methods. “I’m not looking to develop technology to make money, but to save the worldsaid Arup SenGupta, lead author of the work, in a press release from lehigh university. Because reducing our emissions will not solve the problem posed by CO2 already present in our atmosphere.
This is also what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded a little over a year ago. Achieving net zero emissions will require the deployment of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies, or even the creation of artificial carbon sinks, including the implementation of technologies that will directly capture carbon. CO2 in the air — as trees naturally do.
But is touting these technologies today — some of which are quite ready to go — risk-free? This is the question asked by Lancaster University researchers (United Kingdom). More specifically, they wondered if the possibility offered by CCS technologies to remove carbon from the atmosphere might not further delay efforts to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions.
Do not lose sight of the importance of reducing emissions
They report that certain complex computer models developed to simulate how emissions change according to the technologies available show that the carbon capture option does indeed tend to substitute for emission reduction measures. And if some criticisms have been formulated as to the relevance of these results, it turns out that they still tend to guide policies and in fact… to gain in relevance.
Researchers also present other studies that gauge public interest in CO capture technologies2. Studies that seem to conclude that there is a low risk of substituting emission reduction measures with CCS, or even having the opposite effect. But the researchers argue that this is relying a little too much on the rationality of the decisions made. According to them, a certain number of social, cultural, political and economic parameters have not been sufficiently considered.
Although more in-depth studies will still be needed to conclude, the Lancaster University researchers point out that the influence exercised by the most powerful economic interests on government policies does tend to favor the development of carbon capture technologies. carbon at the expense of emission reduction measures. They give as an example the new plan made public by the United Kingdom government. This includes financing to the tune of nearly $25 billion over 20 years for new CO capture sites and storage projects.2 in the North Sea. On the other hand, it does not announce, for example, any measure intended to insulate buildings in order to reduce energy consumption and thus greenhouse gas emissions.
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