Tag Archives: CCS

Sustainability and Carbon Sequestration

Abstract. By burning fossil fuels we have put 3.6 trillion tons of Carbon Dioxide, CO2 in the atmosphere1 in the last 200 years – most in the last 60. This has changed the concentration of atmospheric CO2 from 270 parts per Million, ppm, to 390 ppm, an increase of approximately 31%. This increase of atmospheric CO2 is resulting in changing precipitation and rising temperatures, from the equator to the poles.

The typical modern reductionist approach is to simplify the problem to develop a solution:

“Burning coal, oil, and natural gas puts CO2 into the atmosphere. All we need to do to solve the problem is modify the machines so they burn fossil fuel without releasing CO2 into the atmosphere. How do we do that? We should capture the carbon dioxide, and the arsenic, mercury, other heavy metals, radionucleotides, etc, and store it somewhere.”

But we need to remember that we are burning coal, oil, and natural gas for a reason: to generate heat, hot water, electricity and transportation. There are alternative energy technologies, including nuclear, solar, and wind.

Coal with Carbon Sequestration is estimated to cost $10 to $15 Billion per gigawatt, without considering the costs of mining, processing and transporting the coal, cleaning up after mining, and isolating the arsenicals, mercury, and radionucleotides released from burning coal.  Solar is estimated to cost $6.5 Billion per gigawatt – with no fuel and no wastes. Wind $2 to $3 Billion per gigawatt – with no fuel and no wastes.

We at Popular Logistics think, feel and believe that we need to replace coal with solar and wind immediately.

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Business News That's Fit To Print

There’s a lot in these articles, and a lot to read between the lines in these articles from the New York Times

– Business Section. (Between the Lines Concept 1

– the Business Section, not the Science

section.)

From E.U. Plan to Curb Carbon Dioxide Would Favor Solar Power

By James Kanter.

07energy_190“The European Commission is expected to introduce a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that directs the largest slices of €50 billion available for research and development to solar power and capturing and burying emissions from coal plants.”

“But the plan also signals the need for a reordering of the bloc’s priorities by requiring governments to spend significantly greater sums of money on clean energy even as the world emerges from a deep financial crisis.”

  • 16 Billion Euros for Solar.
  • 13 Billion Euros for emissions capture and storage.
  • 11 billion Euros for enhanced urban efficiency.
  • 7 billion Euros for improving nuclear energy – produce less radioactive waste, minimize proliferation.

Between The Lines Concept 2: Euros 13 Billion for Emissions Capture and Storage – that’s a lot of money. Assuming they can make it work – Carbon Capture and Storage has never been done, and other coal waste storage is expensive and difficult. Kingston, Tennessee Coal Ash Spill – Nasa / National Geographic / Popular Logistics 1 / Popular Logistics 2

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