The Age of Sustainability - Issue #4

The more you look the more you realize that sustainability and climate correction are going mainstream. Here we can see everything in all its weirdness and beauty. First up a story about mechanical carbon sequestration which I am certain will fail to produce meaningful results. We end on a hopeful note of venture capital coming to sustainability.

If you have an idea or a question send it to me and I’ll answer it here.

Denis@BeagleResearch.com

Carbon sequestration is the biggest opportunity for grift and ripoff since Trump University. We need to remove 3 trillion tons of carbon from the environment and sequester it safely for millions of years. This project does a couple million tons per year at a time when we’re putting about 40 giga tons up there joining the other 3 trillion. This approach is also prohibitively energy expensive if extrapolated to 3 trillion tons. A solution that works needs to involve green plants in the sea else we’ll never get to the goal, but a lot of corporations will get rich helping us feel good about doing something.

What’s interesting here is the belief that you can have zero carbon intensity anything. This belief is really a vain attempt to preserve the fossil fuel paradigm which would be great because it would mean we don’t have to change that much to achieve climate goals. But the Second Law of Thermodynamics says, no, sorry, it doesn’t go like that. Doing the zero carbon round trip means taking a relatively small amount of energy out compared to what you have to put back in to reassemble the referenced molecules of methane and jet fuel. The Second Law says you always spend more making the molecules than you harvest. This approach is like trying to unsmoked a cigarette.

Happy to see this. the Senator from New Jersey is supporting climate programs for farmers that can teach them techniques for saving water and maybe capturing some carbon. NJ, the Garden State is no stranger to farms and farmers and hopefully this bill, if it becomes law, will also help farmers in places that are more red.

When venture capital starts paying attention, as Pale Blue Dot is, to climate and sustainability, it’s safe to assume that we are well into the paradigm shift. From here on, laggards (I’m talking to the US Senate here) will look increasingly foolish for standing against commonsense sustainability.