Re: [geo] RE: recent papers on marine ecosystem geoengineering
Greg (cc list and pboyd): I like your paper. But I wonder if the concept of using ocean biomass for harvest and eventual partial placement of half the carbon in soil (as biochar) was inadvertently or intentionally omitted. I see major advantages of using ocean biomass (macroalgae and smaller) for biochar as worthy of your and this list's consideration for these reasons, that seem not to be shared by the options you did discuss: a. it provides rather than consumes energy b. the generated energy can be of any form - solid, gas or liquid - for any end use sector. My preference is to back up wind and solar, not for base load service. c. It can improve most soil types - almost all of which are rapidly depleting - with significant improved out-year nutrition benefits from increased primary production. d. the carbon sequestration, although not infinite, is possibly measured in millennia, certainly centuries - perhaps longer than some you include. e. such harvesting is already occurring, and generally the practice would seem to have little international legal/moral concern, especially if practiced in near-shore waters. Ron - Original Message - From: Greg Rau r...@llnl.gov To: pb...@chemistry.otago.ac.nz, geoengineering@googlegroups.com Sent: Sunday, February 10, 2013 9:44:13 PM Subject: [geo] RE: recent papers on marine ecosystem geoengineering Nor should iron fertilization necessarily be viewed as the poster child for marine CDR. Some other ideas attached - I was limited to 2,00O words. -Greg From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com [geoengineering@googlegroups.com] on behalf of Philip Boyd [pb...@chemistry.otago.ac.nz] Sent: Sunday, February 10, 2013 6:54 PM To: geoengineering@googlegroups.com Subject: [geo] FW: recent papers on marine ecosystem geoengineering Dear Geo group, I have noticed that much of the discussion on this topic are based on older papers. Here is a recent one. Williamson P., D. W.R. Wallace , C.S. Law, P.W. Boyd, Y. Collos, P. Croot, K. Denman, U. Riebesell, S. Takeda, C. Vivian (2012) Ocean fertilization for geoengineering: A review of effectiveness, environmental impacts and emerging governance. Process Safety and Environmental Protection, 9, 475–488. and also a link to a Theme Section on this topic from 2008 Implications of large-scale iron fertilization of the oceans Idea: Howard Browman, Philip W. Boyd Coordination: Philip W. Boyd MEPS 364:213-309 | Complete Theme Section in pdf format (2 MB) Philip Professor Philip Boyd FRSNZ NIWA Centre of Chemical Physical Oceanography Department of Chemistry University of Otago Dunedin New Zealand 03-479-5249 From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com [geoengineering@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Ken Caldeira [kcalde...@carnegiescience.edu] Sent: Monday, February 11, 2013 1:06 PM To: drisc...@atm.ox.ac.uk Cc: geoengineering Subject: Re: [geo] A Cheap and Easy Plan to Stop Global Warming By David Rotman A nicely done article. I would like to expand on one of Ray Pierrehumbert's comments. He is quoted as saying: “The term ‘solar radiation management’ is positively Orwellian. It’s a way to increase comfort levels with this crazy idea.” —Raymond Pierrehumbert He is right that it was created to inrease comfort level, but it was done so with ironic intent. In 2007, I was organizing a meeting that took place at NASA-Ames. (Incidentally, that meeting is where this google group started. http://hdl.handle.net/2060/20070031204 ) There was some nervousness on the part of local NASA officials that the term geoengineering might raise red flags back in Washington. At the time, DOE was talking about carbon management which was a bureaucratic way to speak about the potential for CO2 emissions reduction. To avoid the use of the word geoengineering in the meeting name, I suggested that we create the term Solar Radiation Managment to use for the workshop. It was meant as parody of US-government-style bureaucratic jargon. It was meant as a joke and was intentionally obscurantist. We were laughing about it at the time and never dreamed that it would become standard jargon. The term Solar Radiation Management was meant to lower the profile of the meeting while parodying Washington jargon. It amuses me that it has become standard jargon. What started out as parody has moved on from its comedic roots. Comedy has become drama. Incidentally, lately I have been using the term solar geoengineering as my term of choice to refer to what SRM has come to denote. Best, Ken ___ Ken Caldeira Carnegie Institution for Science Dept of Global Ecology 260 Panama Street, Stanford, CA 94305 USA +1 650 704 7212 kcalde...@carnegiescience.edu http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab @kencaldeira Caldeira Lab is hiring postdoctoral researchers. http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab/Caldeira_employment.html Our YouTube
Re: [geo] Re: Sooty ships may be geoengineering by accident - 06 February 2013 - New Scientist
I wonder if there are any historic measurements of ocean albedo which would allow the effect of these ships on ocean color to be quantified A On Feb 9, 2013 10:32 AM, Russell Seitz russellse...@gmail.com wrote: I'm surprised *New Scientist* writer Jeff Hect failed to note my 2008 account of inadvertant iron fertilization by smokestack fallout from ships, which appeared in *Science* online in response to a 2007 ocean fertilization piece by Eli Kintisch: CARBON SEQUESTRATIONShould Oceanographers Pump Iron? - Eli Kintisch Science 30 November 2007: 1368-1370. - Summary http://www.sciencemag.org/content/318/5855/1368.summary 1. http://www.sciencemag.org/content/318/5855/1368.summary/reply#content-block Ocean Iron Fertilization - Russell Seitz Cambridge, MA, USA E. Kintisch’s article, Should oceanographers pump iron? (News Focus, 30 November 2007, p. 1368) reminds us that controversy surrounds ocean fertilization as a means of offsetting atmospheric carbon dioxide. Biologists are skeptical, because despite the late John Martin’s famous assertion, Give me a half tanker of iron and I'll give you an ice age ( *1*), many offshore areas sequester little carbon because their waters are perennially deficient in nitrogen and phosphorus as well. But Martin’s wish for a series of massive experiments may have been realized anyway—before he was born. During the decades before oil became the dominant marine transportation fuel, burning coal to raise steam at sea spewed literally megatons a year of iron, nitrogen, and phosphorous into nutrient-deficient surface waters. Burning coal typically generates ash equal to ~10% of the fuel mass. In modern combustion technology, electrostatic precipitators, bag houses, and scrubbers remove over 95% of particulates. But no effort was made to capture fly ash in early marine propulsion, and about three-fourths was entrained and released with hot flue gases, the rest being incorporated into stack ash, boiler slag, and scoria (*2*). Owing to the low energy density of coal relative to oil, the 50,000,000 ton fleet of coal-burning ships operating in the early 20th century (*3*) consumed many times its displacement in fuel annually. The efficient but ill-fated Titanic consumed 1.5% of its 42,000 tonne displacement daily, and lesser vessels typically combusted their displacement in bunker coal in a matter of months. The scale of marine fuel demand was such that Europe's 1913 export of 213 million tons of bunker coal represented less than half the world total (*4*). Coal ash typically contains from 2.5% to 8.5% iron (*5*). Much occurs as pyrites (FeS2), and sulfate enrichment of ash particles by its oxidation may enhance the bioavailability of fly ash iron. This suggests that early 20th century European maritime activity alone annually released ~0.39 to 2.16 teragrams of iron at sea, with a high and frequently replenished flux of aerosol iron flux along heavily traveled shipping lanes. But what of nitrogen and phosphorus? Before the Haber process revolutionized nitrogen fixation, one of the most important fertilizers was the ammonium sulfate inevitably co-produced with coal tar in gas works and coke ovens. Since ship's coal typically contains 1 to 3% nitrogen, mostly in polycyclics, the pyrolysis yield of water-soluble pyrroles, pyridine and ammonium compounds from combustion at sea, may also have been in the low-teragram range. Unlike metallurgical coal, the ash of that mined to raise steam typically contained on the order of a kilogram of phosphorus per ton. This suggests that the co-deposition of nutrient phosphorus and nitrogen with iron may have at least locally met the N-P-Fe synergy criterion for enhancement of carbon fixation. Given that literal shiploads of fly ash fell at sea for decades, understanding what exactly was combusted along historic shipping lanes may shed light on the risks and benefits of the more modest CO2 sequestration experiments of today, and perhaps add the record of another historic aerosol (*6*) to the list of those already known to impact climate model estimates of 20th century and future radiative forcing. Russell Seitz Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. References 1. J. H. Martin *et al*., *Nature* 371, 123 (1994). 2. *U.S. EPA Radiation Protection* ( http://www.EPA.gov/rpdweb00/tenorm/coalandcoalash.html). 3. *Lloyds Register* ( http://www.coltoncompany.com/shipping/statistics/wldflt.htm). 4. J. F. Bogardus, *Geographical Review* 20 (4), 642 (1930). 5. S. K. Gupta, T. F. Wall, R. A. Creelman, R. P. Gupta, *Fuel Processing Technology* 56 (issues 1–2), 33 (1998). 6. R. Seitz, *Nature* 323, 116 (1986). ...
[geo] Climate engineering and climate tipping-point scenarios
Friends - You may be interested in the following paper (* http://www.springerlink.com/openurl.asp?genre=articleid=doi:10.1007/s10669-013-9435-8 * http://www.springer.com/alert/urltracking.do?id=Lf45461Mba44a1Sb02fb61). *Title*: Climate engineering and climate tipping-point scenarios *Abstract*: Many scientists fear that anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases have set the Earth on a path of significant, possibly catastrophic, changes. This includes the possibility of exceeding particular thresholds or tipping points in the climate system. In response, governments have proposed emissions reduction targets, but no agreement has been reached. These facts have led some scientists and economists to suggest research into climate engineering. In this paper, we analyze the potential value of one climate engineering technology family, known as solar radiation management (SRM) to manage the risk of differing tipping-point scenarios. We find that adding SRM to a policy of emissions controls may be able to help manage the risk of climate tipping points and that its potential benefits are large. However, the technology does not exist and important indirect costs (e.g., change in precipitation) are not well understood. Thus, we conclude the SRM merits a serious research effort to better understand its efficiency and safety. Best, Eric Bickel University of Texas at Austin -- 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 http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
[geo] Volcanos and climate change: Location, location, location
Interesting – no discussion of cooling effects of aerosol release? Short-lived relative to CO2? -Greg Volcano Location: Greenhouse-Icehouse Key? Episodic Purging of 'Carbonate Capacitor' Drives Long-Term Climate Cycle http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130207115014.htm Feb. 6, 2013 — A new Rice University-led study finds the real estate mantra location, location, location may also explain one of Earth's enduring climate mysteries. The study suggests that Earth's repeated flip-flopping between greenhouse and icehouse states over the past 500 million years may have been driven by the episodic flare-up of volcanoes at key locations where enormous amounts of carbon dioxide are poised for release into the atmosphere. We found that Earth's continents serve as enormous 'carbonate capacitors,' said Rice's Cin-Ty Lee, the lead author of the study in this month's GeoSphere. Continents store massive amounts of carbon dioxide in sedimentary carbonates like limestone and marble, and it appears that these reservoirs are tapped from time to time by volcanoes, which release large amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Lee said as much as 44 percent of carbonates by weight is carbon dioxide. Under most circumstances that carbon stays locked inside Earth's rigid continental crust. One process that can release carbon dioxide from these carbonates is interaction with magma, he said. But that rarely happens on Earth today because most volcanoes are located on island arcs, tectonic plate boundaries that don't contain continental crust. Earth's climate continually cycles between greenhouse and icehouse states, which each last on timescales of 10 million to 100 million years. Icehouse states -- like the one Earth has been in for the past 50 million years -- are marked by ice at the poles and periods of glacial activity. By contrast, the warmer greenhouse states are marked by increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and by an ice-free surface, even at the poles. The last greenhouse period lasted about 50 million to 70 million years and spanned the late Cretaceous, when dinosaurs roamed, and the early Paleogene, when mammals began to diversify. Lee and colleagues found that the planet's greenhouse-icehouse oscillations are a natural consequence of plate tectonics. The research showed that tectonic activity drives an episodic flare-up of volcanoes along continental arcs, particularly during periods when oceans are forming and continents are breaking apart. The continental arc volcanoes that arise during these periods are located on the edges of continents, and the magma that rises through the volcanoes releases enormous quantities of carbon dioxide as it passes through layers of carbonates in the continental crust. Lee, professor of Earth science at Rice, led the four-year study, which was co-authored by three Rice faculty members and additional colleagues at the University of Tokyo, the University of British Columbia, the California Institute of Technology, Texas AM University and Pomona College. Lee said the study breaks with conventional theories about greenhouse and icehouse periods. The standard view of the greenhouse state is that you draw carbon dioxide from the deep Earth interior by a combination of more activity along the mid-ocean ridges -- where tectonic plates spread -- and massive breakouts of lava called 'large igneous provinces,' Lee said. Though both of these would produce more carbon dioxide, it is not clear if these processes alone could sustain the atmospheric carbon dioxide that we find in the fossil record during past greenhouses. Lee is a petrologist and geochemist whose research interests include the formation and evolution of continents as well as the connections between deep Earth and its oceans and atmosphere.. Lee said the conclusions in the study developed over several years, but the initial idea of the research dates to an informal chalkboard-only seminar at Rice in 2008. The talk was given by Rice oceanographer and study co-author Jerry Dickens, a paleoclimate expert; Lee and Rice geodynamicist Adrian Lenardic, another co-author, were in the audience. Jerry was talking about seawater in the Cretaceous, and he mentioned that 93.5 million years ago there was a mass extinction of deepwater organisms that coincided with a global marine anoxic event -- that is, the deep oceans became starved of oxygen, Lee said. Jerry was talking about the impact of anoxic conditions on the biogeochemical cycles of trace metals in the ocean, but I don't remember much else that he said that day because it had dawned on me that 93 million years ago was a very interesting time for North America. There was a huge flare-up of volcanism along the western margin of North America, and the peak of all this activity was 93 million years ago. I thought, 'Wow!' Lee recalled. I know coincidence doesn't mean causality, but it certainly got me
