Re: [geo] Carbon budget/removal in NYTimes interactive

[Andrew Lockley]

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/03/150319143337.htm

Geoengineering proposal may backfire: Ocean pipes 'not cool,' would end up
warming climateDate:March 19, 2015Source:Carnegie InstitutionSummary:There
are a variety of proposals that involve using vertical ocean pipes to move
seawater to the surface from the depths in order to reap different
potential climate benefits. One idea involves using ocean pipes to
facilitate direct physical cooling of the surface ocean by replacing warm
surface ocean waters with colder, deeper waters. New research shows that
these pipes could actually increase global warming quite drastically

On 12 Sep 2017 00:21, "Robert Tulip"  wrote:

> Dear Andrew
> Thank you very much for bringing this potential problem with Deep Ocean
> Water as an algae nutrient source to attention. I would like to find out
> more about the possible mechanism that you allude to.  I looked again at
> the 2005 IPCC paper on Ocean Storage  led
> by Professor Caldeira but did not find anything to support your reference.
> If more recent work shows that raising DOW could cause warming I would like
> to see it.  I am following up other responses to my comments directly with
> their authors.
> Robert Tulip
>
>
> --
> *From:* Andrew Lockley 
> *To:* Robert Tulip ; geoengineering <
> geoengineering@googlegroups.com>
> *Sent:* Friday, 8 September 2017, 10:47
> *Subject:* Re: [geo] Carbon budget/removal in NYTimes interactive
>
> Caldeira et al showed that moving water in this way causes warming.
>
> A
>
> On 8 Sep 2017 00:15, "'Robert Tulip' via geoengineering" <
> geoengineering@googlegroups.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks Cristoph.
> Deep Ocean Water, with volume about a billion cubic kilometres below the
> thermocline, has about three ppm nitrate and phosphate, about 3000 cubic
> kilometres of each, as I understand the numbers. Tidal pumping arrays along
> the world's continental shelves could raise enough DOW to the surface,
> mimicking natural algae blooms, to fuel controlled algae production at the
> scale required for seven million square kilometres of factories.  Piping
> CO2 from power plants etc out to ocean algae farms could clean up all the
> polluted air of the world.
> Robert Tulip
>
>
> --
> *From:* Christoph Voelker 
> *To:* geoengineering@googlegroups. com 
> *Sent:* Friday, 8 September 2017, 8:43
> *Subject:* Re: [geo] Carbon budget/removal in NYTimes interactive
>
> I must admit that I am getting skeptical when I hear numbers in that order
> of magnitude:
> The total net primary production in the oceans presently is about 50 Gt
> carbon, and 80% of that is converted back into inorganic carbon (and
> nutrients) by heterotrophs before it gets a chance to sink out from the
> sunlit upper layer of the ocean. The roughly 10 Gt carbon (some newer works
> even estimate just 6 Gt carbon) that sink out have to be balanced by the
> upward mixing of nutrients (and a little bit by atmospheric deposition of
> bioavailable nitrogen and phosphorus) in the Redfield ratio of about
> 106:16:1 of C:N:P.
> So, if you want to remove 20 Gt carbon per year from the atmosphere, you'd
> have to increase the nutrient supply to the total surface ocean by a factor
> of three, maybe four. Maybe I am a bit too pessimistic here, because there
> are species like Sargassum which have a higher C:N:P ratio than the average
> phytoplankton, so you get somewhat more carbon per nitrogen/phosphorus. But
> even if it is just doubling, I can't imagine that you can sustain such a
> nutrient consumption by fertilizing from outside the ocean (especially
> since phosphorus is scarce already now), you'd have to tap into the
> inorganic nutrients stored in the deep ocean. How long can you do that?
> If we assume that we harvest all the 20 Gt carbon in algae from these
> factories and do something durable with them (to minimize lossed through
> heterotrophy and problems with creating oxygen minimum zones), we
> effectively remove nitrogen/phosphorus from the ocean. How much is that per
> year?
> Let us for simplicity assume Redfield ratios, I grant errors by a factor
> of two or so. 20 Gt carbon then corresponds to (20
> g/12(g/mol)/6.625(molC/molN))* 1.0e15 or about 2.5e14 mol nitrogen. The
> ocean has a volume of 1.33e18 m^3, and the average concentration of
> available nitrogen (mostly nitrate) is 30 micromol/L or mmol/m^3
> (calculated from the world ocean atlas), most of that is in the deep ocean.
> This gives a total inventory of 4.0e16 mol nitrogen. 2.5e14 mol/year is
> thus more than half of a percent of the total available nitrogen in the
> world oceans, which means you could try that for about 150 years, then
> everything is gone At that pace, nitrogen fixers are unlikely to resupply
> the loss (nowaday, the residence time of nitrogen is roughly 5000 years),
> and they can do that only for nitrogen, not for phosphorus anyway. Letting
> techn

Re: [geo] Carbon budget/removal in NYTimes interactive

['Robert Tulip' via geoengineering]

Dear AndrewThank you very much for bringing this potential problem with Deep 
Ocean Water as an algae nutrient source to attention. I would like to find out 
more about the possible mechanism that you allude to.  I looked again at the 
2005 IPCC paper on Ocean Storage led by Professor Caldeira but did not find 
anything to support your reference.  If more recent work shows that raising DOW 
could cause warming I would like to see it.  I am following up other responses 
to my comments directly with their authors. Robert Tulip

  From: Andrew Lockley 
 To: Robert Tulip ; geoengineering 
 
 Sent: Friday, 8 September 2017, 10:47
 Subject: Re: [geo] Carbon budget/removal in NYTimes interactive
   
Caldeira et al showed that moving water in this way causes warming.
A
On 8 Sep 2017 00:15, "'Robert Tulip' via geoengineering" 
 wrote:

Thanks Cristoph.Deep Ocean Water, with volume about a billion cubic kilometres 
below the thermocline, has about three ppm nitrate and phosphate, about 3000 
cubic kilometres of each, as I understand the numbers. Tidal pumping arrays 
along the world's continental shelves could raise enough DOW to the surface, 
mimicking natural algae blooms, to fuel controlled algae production at the 
scale required for seven million square kilometres of factories.  Piping CO2 
from power plants etc out to ocean algae farms could clean up all the polluted 
air of the world.Robert Tulip

  From: Christoph Voelker 
 To: geoengineering@googlegroups. com 
 Sent: Friday, 8 September 2017, 8:43
 Subject: Re: [geo] Carbon budget/removal in NYTimes interactive
  
 I must admit that I am getting skeptical when I hear numbers in that order of 
magnitude: 
  The total net primary production in the oceans presently is about 50 Gt 
carbon, and 80% of that is converted back into inorganic carbon (and nutrients) 
by heterotrophs before it gets a chance to sink out from the sunlit upper layer 
of the ocean. The roughly 10 Gt carbon (some newer works even estimate just 6 
Gt carbon) that sink out have to be balanced by the upward mixing of nutrients 
(and a little bit by atmospheric deposition of bioavailable nitrogen and 
phosphorus) in the Redfield ratio of about 106:16:1 of C:N:P. 
  So, if you want to remove 20 Gt carbon per year from the atmosphere, you'd 
have to increase the nutrient supply to the total surface ocean by a factor of 
three, maybe four. Maybe I am a bit too pessimistic here, because there are 
species like Sargassum which have a higher C:N:P ratio than the average 
phytoplankton, so you get somewhat more carbon per nitrogen/phosphorus. But 
even if it is just doubling, I can't imagine that you can sustain such a 
nutrient consumption by fertilizing from outside the ocean (especially since 
phosphorus is scarce already now), you'd have to tap into the inorganic 
nutrients stored in the deep ocean. How long can you do that? 
  If we assume that we harvest all the 20 Gt carbon in algae from these 
factories and do something durable with them (to minimize lossed through 
heterotrophy and problems with creating oxygen minimum zones), we effectively 
remove nitrogen/phosphorus from the ocean. How much is that per year? 
  Let us for simplicity assume Redfield ratios, I grant errors by a factor of 
two or so. 20 Gt carbon then corresponds to (20 g/12(g/mol)/6.625(molC/molN))* 
1.0e15 or about 2.5e14 mol nitrogen. The ocean has a volume of 1.33e18 m^3, and 
the average concentration of available nitrogen (mostly nitrate) is 30 
micromol/L or mmol/m^3 (calculated from the world ocean atlas), most of that is 
in the deep ocean. This gives a total inventory of 4.0e16 mol nitrogen. 2.5e14 
mol/year is thus more than half of a percent of the total available nitrogen in 
the world oceans, which means you could try that for about 150 years, then 
everything is gone At that pace, nitrogen fixers are unlikely to resupply the 
loss (nowaday, the residence time of nitrogen is roughly 5000 years), and they 
can do that only for nitrogen, not for phosphorus  anyway. Letting 
technological problems aside (like: How do you move 2.5% of the total nitrogen 
in the world oceans evry year up to an area 2% of the ocean surface) I would 
call the whole idea - at least that the scale suggested - a prime example of an 
unsustainable process.  
  Best regards, 
  Christoph Voelker
  
 On 07.09.17 23:37, 'Robert Tulip' via geoengineering wrote:
  
 
 The assumption behind the NYT interactive model that the upper bound for 
carbon removal is 12 GT CO2 by 2080 is too slow and small.  We should think 
five times as much and five times as fast.   Immediate aggressive investment to 
build industrial algae factories at sea could remove twenty gigatons of carbon 
(50 GT CO2) from the air per year by 2030, using 2% of the ocean surface, 
funded by use of the produced algae.   That would stabilise the climate and 
enable no change in emission trajectories, a policy result that would satisfy 
both the needs of the climate and th

[geo] FW: SOS 2017 Session spotlight 4 - Ocean NETs - CO2 Sequestration Via Ocean-Based Negative Emissions Technologies

[Wil Burns]

FYI. wil



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Dr. Wil Burns
Co-Executive Director, Forum for Climate Engineering Assessment, School of 
International Service, American University

650.281.9126 | w...@feronia.org | 
http://www.ceassessment.org | Skype: 
wil.burns
 |
2650 Haste St., Towle Hall #G07, Berkeley, CA 94720| View my research on my 
SSRN Author page: http://ssrn.com/author=240348

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From: World Ocean Council [mailto:i...@oceancouncil.org]
Sent: Monday, September 11, 2017 5:55 AM
To: Wil Burns 
Subject: SOS 2017 Session spotlight 4 - Ocean NETs - CO2 Sequestration Via 
Ocean-Based Negative Emissions Technologies


[http://sable.madmimi.com/view?id=37127.2901327.1.87a8f445e52ebb868c3004dc464cca4f]

Sustainable Ocean Summit 2017 SESSION SPOTLIGHT Ocean NETs: CO2 Sequestration 
Via Ocean-Based Negative Emissions Technologies (NETs) The Internatio


[SOS2017 bannerRegistrationOpen 
600x150px]


Sustainable Ocean Summit 2017 SESSION SPOTLIGHT 



[***]


Ocean NETs: CO2 Sequestration Via Ocean-Based Negative Emissions Technologies 
(NETs)


[Screen Shot 2017-09-08 at 
21.10.24]




The International Climate Agreement (Paris 2015) requires negative emission 
technologies (NETs) to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in order to 
meet planetary safe limits. NETs need to transfer carbon from the atmosphere to 
a safe and environmentally sound storage. Developing and implementing NETs are 
critical to all industries with a carbon footprint who already or will in the 
near future have a price on their carbon output.

Although there is much attention to potential land based NETs, there is growing 
evidence that the ocean is the dominant player in global carbon cycling and 
storage and in the planet’s temperature regulation. This means that ocean-based 
NETs must be given serious consideration for their potential to make a 
significant contribution to climate mitigation.

Chemical and biological Ocean NETs are being explored, including: ocean 
alkalinity shifts (introducing bicarbonates), direct CO2 injection (seabed and 
water column), growing seaweed for deep ocean deposition, expansion of coastal 
ecosystems that store carbon, adjusting ocean primary productivity (e.g. 
artificial upwelling, addition of macronutrients nitrogen and/or phosphorus, 
addition of trace elements such as iron and silicon, enhanced light 
penetration, promoting the growth of nitrogen fixing cyanobacteria).

Researchers, private enterprises and public bodies exploring Ocean NETs 
coordination could benefit from a structure and process to enhance coordination 
and exchange. The World Ocean Council (WOC) is working to address this by 
developing a global Ocean NET platform to bring together science, policy, 
business and other interests.

The SOS 2017 session on “Ocean NETs: CO2 Sequestration Via Ocean-Based Negative 
Emissions Technologies (NETs)” will address:
• What are the requirements of the International Climate Agreement (Paris 2015) 
for negative emission technologies (NET’s) to remove atmospheric CO2 to meet 
planetary safe limits for global temperatures?
• What are the potential ocean-based NETs, what science is available on them 
and what are the risks and benefits of Ocean NETs?
• What is needed to advance careful, science-based consideration of Ocean NETs 
as a potentially viable, important means to address increasing atmospheric CO2?

The SOS 2017 session will focus on tangible goals that can assist in advancing 
the evaluation of Ocean NETs, e.g. determining the potential impact and status 
of Ocean NETs; identifying research gaps and unknowns; reviewing the cost of 
implementation of Ocean NETs; reviewing the legal framework for Ocean NETs; 
exploring the conceptual design of a future multipurpose Ocean NET station for 
capturing CO2, producing food, generating power, and interacting with other 
ocean users. With a cluster of innovative ocean technologies there is 
significantly more potential to build commercially viable ocean enterprises 
that help ensure that innovative NET solutions combine the very best ocean 
technologies and skills in multi-functional marine technology sites housing and 
enabling Ocean NETs.

To better understand the opportunities and challenges of Ocean NETs, experts 
and representatives from the ocean business community and other stakeholders 
are invited to get engaged as speakers or participants

[geo] SOS 2017 Session spotlight 4 - Ocean NETs - CO2 Sequestration Via Ocean-Based Negative Emissions Technologies

[Ken Caldeira]

fyi



Sustainable Ocean Summit 2017 SESSION SPOTLIGHT Ocean NETs: CO2
Sequestration Via Ocean-Based Negative Emissions Technologies (NETs) The
Internatio

[image: SOS2017 bannerRegistrationOpen 600x150px]



Sustainable Ocean Summit 2017 SESSION SPOTLIGHT

[image: ***]
Ocean NETs: CO2 Sequestration Via Ocean-Based Negative Emissions
Technologies (NETs)
[image: Screen Shot 2017-09-08 at 21.10.24]


The International Climate Agreement (Paris 2015) requires negative emission
technologies (NETs) to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in order
to meet planetary safe limits. NETs need to transfer carbon from the
atmosphere to a safe and environmentally sound storage. Developing and
implementing NETs are critical to all industries with a carbon footprint
who already or will in the near future have a price on their carbon output.

Although there is much attention to potential land based NETs, there is
growing evidence that the ocean is the dominant player in global carbon
cycling and storage and in the planet’s temperature regulation. This means
that ocean-based NETs must be given serious consideration for their
potential to make a significant contribution to climate mitigation.

Chemical and biological Ocean NETs are being explored, including: ocean
alkalinity shifts (introducing bicarbonates), direct CO2 injection (seabed
and water column), growing seaweed for deep ocean deposition, expansion of
coastal ecosystems that store carbon, adjusting ocean primary productivity
(e.g. artificial upwelling, addition of macronutrients nitrogen and/or
phosphorus, addition of trace elements such as iron and silicon, enhanced
light penetration, promoting the growth of nitrogen fixing cyanobacteria).

Researchers, private enterprises and public bodies exploring Ocean NETs
coordination could benefit from a structure and process to enhance
coordination and exchange. The World Ocean Council (WOC) is working to
address this by developing a global Ocean NET platform to bring together
science, policy, business and other interests.

*The SOS 2017 session on “Ocean NETs: CO2 Sequestration Via Ocean-Based
Negative Emissions Technologies (NETs)”* will address:
• What are the requirements of the International Climate Agreement (Paris
2015) for negative emission technologies (NET’s) to remove atmospheric CO2
to meet planetary safe limits for global temperatures?
• What are the potential ocean-based NETs, what science is available on
them and what are the risks and benefits of Ocean NETs?
• What is needed to advance careful, science-based consideration of Ocean
NETs as a potentially viable, important means to address increasing
atmospheric CO2?

The SOS 2017 session will focus on tangible goals that can assist in
advancing the evaluation of Ocean NETs, e.g. determining the potential
impact and status of Ocean NETs; identifying research gaps and unknowns;
reviewing the cost of implementation of Ocean NETs; reviewing the legal
framework for Ocean NETs; exploring the conceptual design of a future
multipurpose Ocean NET station for capturing CO2, producing food,
generating power, and interacting with other ocean users. With a cluster of
innovative ocean technologies there is significantly more potential to
build commercially viable ocean enterprises that help ensure that
innovative NET solutions combine the very best ocean technologies and
skills in multi-functional marine technology sites housing and enabling
Ocean NETs.

To better understand the opportunities and challenges of Ocean NETs,
experts and representatives from the ocean business community and other
stakeholders are invited to get engaged as speakers or participants in the
SOS 2017 session on this critical issue by contacting the WOC at
i...@oceancouncil.org <%20i...@oceancouncil.org>.
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