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writing for godot

Unmoved by the Carbon Capture Rapture

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Written by John Glassco   
Monday, 05 August 2013 07:40
Is Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) a real possibility to offset carbon pollution by the energy industry, or is it a pipe dream?

An credible peer reviewed article "Economic and energetic analysis of capturing CO2 from ambient air" from the National Academy of Sciences, although three years old, is excellent. The authors are a collaboration of experts from MIT, Berkeley, and Stanford Universities. It essentially says that the currently popular Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) concept has some critical flaws. These flaws are overlooked by an industry that is desperate for the promise of CCS to clean-up our increasingly dirty atmosphere.

Whether in good or bad faith, the energy industry is relying on the promotion of this CCS concept to erase the concern that many of us have about the burning of fossil fuel in the atmosphere. It is increasingly clear, even to some skeptics, that our collective appetite for energy is contributing to the pending environmental disaster known as global warming. Some concerned scientists have raised the alarm that this experimental CCS technology is impractical, too expensive, and not yet perfected. If we are ever to be able to capture and sequester carbon dioxide, this article outlines some of the roadblocks.

The energy lobby is painting a rosy future. They are hinting that with CCS, we could burn all fossil fuels, coal, oil, natural gas, and presumably wood that we and they want. Yes, and without any worry that this burning would contribute to global warming. With CCS, the argument goes, the carbon released by combustion is re-captured, pressurized, liquefied and buried deep underground in impervious rock formations - for ever.

The problem is that this process of CO2 capture alone, without the additional problems of transportation, injection into the earth, and perpetual storage is more expensive from an energy perspective, than leaving the stuff in the ground in the first place. The authors speculate that rejecting CCS and instead using the money to exploit already available safer, cleaner, and cheaper energy technology may be a superior (and smarter) strategy.

Unfortunately, getting this point across to people who are already skeptical about the value of science and physics may never happen. Skeptics are already suspicious of people like these qualified science authors. If the skeptics continue to block sensible alternatives to our current (non) energy policy, we must be prepared to leave them standing at the dock, and to the peril of their own uncertain future.
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