Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
Earth Canada Science

For Carbon-Capture Experiment, Researchers Dye Canada's Halifax Harbor Pink (ctvnews.ca) 40

The CBC reports that "Some parts of the Halifax harbour turned a bright shade of pink on Thursday — for science."

After researchers dumped in 500 litres of safe, water-soluble dye, "boats, drones and underwater robots were then deployed to map the movement of the dye, so researchers can understand where materials spread and how quickly they do so." The CTV calls it "part of long-term research project that could help reverse some of the world's greenhouse gas emissions" by Dalhousie University and the climate-solutions research organization Planetary Technologies: The move is the first step, says Katja Fennel, an oceanographer at Dalhousie, before researchers release alkaline material into the water this fall. That material will effectively act as an antacid for the ocean, helping to neutralize the additional acidic carbon dioxide being absorbed by the world's oceans. "The purpose is to actually induce the ocean to take up atmospheric CO2 — CO2 from the air — and help us reduce legacy carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere," Fennel told CTV News.
To track the uptake of carbon dioxide, researchers need to account for the movement of water. So "The ultimate goal here is to test an idea for a technology that would help us reduce atmospheric CO2," one oceanographer leading the research told the CBC, "and could be one tool in the toolbox for fighting climate change..."

They point out that the ocean holds 50 times as much CO2 as is in the atmosphere, and call the experiment "cutting edge...world-leading research... Ocean alkalinity enhancement has the greatest potential, actually, in terms of storing carbon permanently and safely at a scale that is relevant for global climate."

Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader Baron_Yam for sharing the article.
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

For Carbon-Capture Experiment, Researchers Dye Canada's Halifax Harbor Pink

Comments Filter:
  • ...movie [youtube.com] quote.
  • by guruevi ( 827432 ) on Saturday August 12, 2023 @02:50PM (#63762614)

    Seems like this is a commercial entity, but they uses an electrolyzer to purify rocks to create an antacid that they would then dump into the ocean, releasing hydrogen in the process (I'm assuming the oxygen stays in the water).

    Basically they're burning oil to crush and electrolyze rocks, then they transport it with diesel trucks to the shore, where it gets loaded on boats running on bunker fuel, to them dump in the ocean which they hope will 'encourage' the water to become more soluble to carbon dioxide. Sounds like homeopathy to me.

    The process they use seems to be the same one that is used in commercial hydrogen production. At this point, hydrogen production with this process is not at all carbon neutral, even if you capture the complete output and use it to replace carbon emissions (hydrogen production is never going to be a perpetuum mobile). These idiots want to dump their product in the ocean just so they can sell carbon credits in the next few years to 'investors'.

    • by Baron_Yam ( 643147 ) on Saturday August 12, 2023 @03:07PM (#63762638)

      For the early stages, I would assume your comments regarding the carbon-friendliness are true... but this is the experimental stage.

      In the long run, there's no reason the required mining, processing, transport, and delivery couldn't all be direct-electric ultimately powered by 'green' power generation.

      With regard to your summary of the endeavour as 'homeopathy' I have to strongly disagree. It's actual science-based chemistry, and essentially they're looking to artificially accelerate a natural process.

      What's missing in the science here is a model for what elevated CO2 levels do to marine environments even if you've resolved the acidity issue. Maybe it's obvious to a marine biologist, but I'm not one of those so it'd be helpful if they addressed the problem. After all, we know more CO2 in the atmosphere impairs cognition in humans - and presumably in pretty much all other animals to some degree.

      • What's missing in the science here is a model for what elevated CO2 levels do to marine environments even if you've resolved the acidity issue.

        Mu. If you resolve the acidity issue, then you don't have elevated CO2 levels, because the CO2 in the water reacts with the water to form acid.

    • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      Apparently you don't know what homeopathy is.

    • Is this really just part of the gay agenda to pinkify the whole planet?

    • I can agree this is a commercial entity behind this. What I see though is a commercial entity looking for a place to dump their mining tails and also claim some kind of carbon offset credit or something.

      There's a number of minerals that are naturally alkaline with small deposits of rare earth elements, precious and semi-precious metals, and other elements with potential economic value. But part of that value is going to be offset by the costs of disposing of what is left over. If this left over material

  • by beckett ( 27524 ) on Saturday August 12, 2023 @03:38PM (#63762678) Homepage Journal
    If the company just come out and say âoewe are buying a lot of baking soda, and throwing it awayâ, it would save time.
  • by MacMann ( 7518492 ) on Saturday August 12, 2023 @03:44PM (#63762688)

    This looks to me like some experiment where the people looking to carry it out decided to tie it to global warming in an effort to improve the chances of getting funding and approval. Had this been announced as an experiment on the propagation of an oil spill, as one example, then it would likely go nowhere.

    I'm quite suspect of anything that claims to be helpful in fighting global warming. Most every case turns out to be some kind of scam.

    If people really want to see CO2 emissions be reduced then there's plenty of papers written by actual experts in the field on how to make that happen. We could start by doing what is advised in these papers. Once on the path they laid out, efforts well known and a kind of "low hanging fruit", then we could start looking for ways to improve on their advice.

    • If people really want to see CO2 emissions be reduced then there's plenty of papers written by actual experts in the field on how to make that happen. We could start by doing what is advised in these papers. Once on the path they laid out, efforts well known and a kind of "low hanging fruit", then we could start looking for ways to improve on their advice.

      Well, if it were "low-hanging fruit", it would have already been done.

      Real world solutions ave to be economically and politically acceptable too. Not just wish fulfillment.

  • That a lot of the "solutions" for climate change are going to be worse than the problem they're trying to solve?
    • Being a good judge of human character, can I say that that is why I don't like any of them?

    • by PPH ( 736903 )

      Worse for whom? The consultants? The carbon capture scheme venture capitalist?

      There are piles of money to be made here.

    • by Z80a ( 971949 )

      Normally we trade a simple brutal problem for a less brutal but complicated to deal with one.
      For example, we mostly traded hunger, diseases and environment exposure for global warming.
       

    • by jonadab ( 583620 )
      Because whatever does not remain part of the solution, ultimately ends up being part of the precipitate.

      HTH.HAND.
  • by PPH ( 736903 )

    Was this sponsored by Pepto-Bismol?

  • by AntisocialNetworker ( 5443888 ) on Sunday August 13, 2023 @01:53AM (#63763296)

    Not so much the pink water - presumably even fish have been hit by the saturation Barbenheimer publicity - but dumping loads of alkali in their environment. It's not like we don't dump enough trash in the oceans...

  • ... or is notable to me, anyway, is how offended some people would be if there were some cool technological solutions.

    I mean, where's the pain in that? The penance? The comeuppance? The divine punishment????

  • Sure, why not? The ocean is infinitely able to absorb whatever we toss in it. This has been proven over and over in the same way that there are infinite fish to take out of it.

    Bottom line: if you make people scared enough you can convince them to do anything and profit from it. The fear-mongering on climate change is a double-edged sword.

  • by groobly ( 6155920 )

    Surely, they must be using AI. No?

    • by jonadab ( 583620 )
      Of course.

      The entire plan was devised by ChatGPT, when they asked it to create a fifth-grade science fair project.

We're here to give you a computer, not a religion. - attributed to Bob Pariseau, at the introduction of the Amiga

Working...