Carbon sucker

[Dr H]

Yeah, just look at Brazil.

Things may  not be working out so great, in Brazil.

So it is hard to say what is going on with this carbon sucking energy. Technically it is possible, but since it is all left to private businesses we more or less have to take their word for it. If you want to be cynical you can be and if you want to be optimistic I guess it is too early. But should this all be abandoned? Or should there be government funded programs that perhaps have bigger chances of developing it?

I'm not cynical, just cautious.

I am especially cautious of single-sector projects being offered as "the solution".  That attitude feeds the (American, especially) passion for the quick fix, and helps foster an attitude that we don't have a serious problem and can turn nature on and off like a beer tap.

These guys with the new fuel may really have something, but like I said, it's not really possible to make a good assessment from the information presented.

Are there perhaps some other solutions? Like could Sahara be irrigated using mirror solar energy and planted with new rain-forest? It seems very much so that it was even featured in that new "Cosmos" TV series how some guy during ww1 was going to do it but then they melted his stuff to cannons.

There are lots of things we could be doing -- we need to get off our collective ass and start doing them.

It should be noted, however, that it's not just radical conservatives that stand in the way of alternative energy projects.  In my state I've watched a number of clean energy proposals shot down by well-meaning, left-leaning conservationists.  

We get a significant amount of our electricity from hydroelectric installations, but we are not increasing this sector; instead we have been systematically removing dams, theoretically to bolster the salmon population.  A tidal generation installation was nixed over concerns that it might impact whale migrations.  A geothermal proposal was shot down over concerns that it might negatively affect the clarity of Crater Lake (even though it would have been 30 miles away and at a lower elevation).  Proposed solar installations in the high desert have been blocked over concerns that large fields of solar cells would alter fragile desert ecology.

Some of these are valid concerns.  But we need to educate people to realize that you don't get something for nothing.  Every form of energy production has some kind of potentially negative impact; some less than others, but they all have them.  We need to do realistic cost/benefit analyses, and decide what we are willing to give up to approach the kind of lifestyles we want to have.  We could, for example, just give up electricity, which would solve a lot of problems -- while creating a lot more.  Or we might have to decide that we need to give up salmon or a certain amount of desert ecology, in exchange for lights at night, heat in the winter, and reliable food preservation.

Maybe the best solution would be a drastically reduced population -- but I don't see that happening.

There was also some other segment on Vice and are you optimistic about this?





I mean imagine if this amount of clean energy was available we could suck carbon from air and join it with hydrogen for almost no price at all - but again, it's all left to private businesses to develop.

I think nuclear energy has be a part of any energy program with a serious design to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  Lithium and thorium reactors have not been getting nearly the kind of attention they should be -- these are in the same category as the design this guy is proposing.  This certainly should be pursued.