Eliminate carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the atmosphere, to save our climate, we will have no choice but to go there. But researchers today are warning us that it will also be necessary to plan to store it for at least 1,000 years.
Success in removing carbon dioxide (CO₂) from our atmosphere today appears essential to achieving our climate goals. Don’t just eliminate it, but also store it. “Sustainable”as generally accepted. But what does it mean in this case? “Sustainable” ? This is the question that researchersInstitute for Environment and Climate Scienceasked the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH, Switzerland) themselves.
Sequester CO₂, but for how long?
In the magazine Communication Earth and Environmentthey provide an answer that will not please those currently developing programs aimed at eliminating CO₂.the windthe wind. These programs, in fact, usually want to be stored CarbonCarbon Over 100 years on average. But by running a climate model, ETH researchers discovered that complacency in such terms could lead our planet to an additional warming of 1.1°C by 2500. Because a large part of the CO₂ stored in this way will be released back into the air. The carbon in our atmosphere naturally returns to the earth.
gave DurationDuration It takes 1000 years for carbon to return to Earth naturally. This is why researchers now recommend targeting strategies capable of storing CO₂ for longer periods of time.
Technologies to store CO₂ for at least 1,000 years
Natural restraint will not suffice for this. Because plants definitely remove carbon from the air. But when they die, they give back. And even long-lived plants do not allow CO₂ to be stored for more than 100 years. Not to mention the risk ofBroadcastingBroadcasting Expected to be associated with wildfires. So the researchers recommend focusing on what they call forced sequestration, which involves, for example, forcibly injecting CO₂ into underground rock formations. Such methods should keep carbon out of our atmosphere for at least 1,000 years.
