Look it from the other end. A first of a kind machine collects CO2 at $600 per ton. Compared to the first solar panel this is a steal. It has a much smaller footprint than a forest with the same CO2 collection capacity. And presumably it will get better over time. This is not a CDR scheme, this is a scheme to provide CO2 to a greenhouse. Later, when the price comes down you can attach it to a CDR scheme. I have seen algae growers pay more than $600 per ton of CO2 to have it delivered in a tanker truck.
So this is a first starting point to show that you can collect CO2 from the air at a cost which is one-order-of magnitude higher than what makes commercial sense. Most first of a kind do that. This cost is not much different than what it costs the flue gas scrubbers on a first try. Now we have a baseline from which to make things better. Klaus PS There are ways to eliminate the fans (and their energy consumption), there are ways of reducing the heat demand. So let’s see how to make it better, rather than trying to strangle the technology in the cradle From: <geoengineering@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net> Reply-To: Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net> Date: Thursday, July 27, 2017 at 11:23 AM To: Geoengineering <geoengineering@googlegroups.com> Subject: [geo] More on Climeworks via Roger Streit: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-climatechange-geoengineering-idUSKBN1AB0J3<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.reuters.com_article_us-2Dclimatechange-2Dgeoengineering-2DidUSKBN1AB0J3&d=DwMFaQ&c=l45AxH-kUV29SRQusp9vYR0n1GycN4_2jInuKy6zbqQ&r=hFjA8A8KwwhQx5qilpfIleTL0XYVr_fckT8DnwIEWlQ&m=PmvpmCUiHB8MrniRdVHBs5GzsTOSCZtynNv-eul7dlE&s=ldLtHFlkGiTMYEyZEk8tDTVGae5179KVvJgn81k-_IY&e=> Some interesting factoids: "...Climeworks began to suck greenhouse gases from thin air in May with giant fans and filters in a $23 million project that it calls the world's first "commercial carbon dioxide capture plant"" "Climeworks reckons it now costs about $600 to extract a tonne of carbon dioxide from the air and the plant's full capacity due by the end of 2017 is only 900 tonnes a year. That's equivalent to the annual emissions of only 45 Americans." >From the Climeworks website: "The majority of the energy required to run the >direct air capture plant comes from low-grade/waste heat." But what source of >electricity is powering the fans? If grid electricity then the C footprint >must be subtracted from the CO2 captured. How much? Also the CO2 is used to >grow food/plants, so the storage lifetime is <1yr. So is this a CDR scheme or >a CO2 emissions reduction scheme (by avoiding fossil-derived CO2 use)? 900 tonnes of CO2 extracted/yr: Assuming that a growing forest consumes and stores 5 tonnes CO2 yr^-1ha^-1, Climeworks is consuming CO2 at a rate equivalent to that of 180 hectares of forest. Cost/benefit/tradeoffs? Greg ""Relying on big future deployments of carbon removal technologies is like eating lots of dessert today, with great hopes for liposuction tomorrow," Christopher Field, a Stanford University professor of climate change, wrote in May." -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__groups.google.com_group_geoengineering&d=DwMFaQ&c=l45AxH-kUV29SRQusp9vYR0n1GycN4_2jInuKy6zbqQ&r=hFjA8A8KwwhQx5qilpfIleTL0XYVr_fckT8DnwIEWlQ&m=PmvpmCUiHB8MrniRdVHBs5GzsTOSCZtynNv-eul7dlE&s=cn-A-gn85k0oK0NEarM_JgIJsepTniF2hzM2KqfZfnc&e=>. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__groups.google.com_d_optout&d=DwMFaQ&c=l45AxH-kUV29SRQusp9vYR0n1GycN4_2jInuKy6zbqQ&r=hFjA8A8KwwhQx5qilpfIleTL0XYVr_fckT8DnwIEWlQ&m=PmvpmCUiHB8MrniRdVHBs5GzsTOSCZtynNv-eul7dlE&s=KS9EaALoF8l-bLijWwLYJWwRn_kdSXPxGj2XdZuN8aE&e=>. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
