The global scientific community has focused efforts on carbon capture and storage (CCS) for at least 29 years following the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which came into force on 21 March 1994. Nevertheless, despite 29 years of efforts negligible carbon storage is occurring at present. Of the ~40 gigatons of anthropogenic carbon emitted to the atmosphere in 2020, ~40 megatons of carbon, or less than 0.1% were captured and stored. Of the ~40 megatons of carbon captured and stored ~90% was through enhanced oil recovery. Life cycle analysis shows that current CO2 promoted enhanced oil recovery methods emit more CO2 that they store. The net mass of CO2 captured and stored ignoring enhanced oil recovery was on the order of 4 megatons in 2020, less than 0.01% of the corresponding anthroprogenic flux.
Much of the early scientific early effort took account of the natural carbon cycle, which has been efficient at moderating atmospheric carbon concentrations and global temperature over geologic times. Carbon dioxide is short-lived in the atmosphere. The average half-life of CO2 in the atmosphere is ~4 years. Roughly one eight of the carbon in the atmosphere circulates in and out of the oceans and in and out of the biosphere annually. The atmosphere is also a relatively small CO2 reservoir. The 800 gigatons of carbon in the atmosphere is dwarfed by the ~2,000 gigatons of carbon in the biosphere, the ~40,000 gigatons of carbon in the oceans and the >90,000,000 tons of carbon in the Earth’s crust, largely as carbonate minerals. These facts suggested the transfer of carbon from the atmosphere to one of these larger reservoirs could readily solve global warming. This led initial research into assessing forestry, increasing ocean alkalinity, and injecting carbon into the subsurface.
Relatively little was done to find industrial solutions until recently when public and government action threatened to 1) impose restrictions on and 2) provide financial motivation to limit carbon emission to the atmosphere. The potential financial rewards due have motivated the creation of hundreds of start-up companies to be created, many raising hundreds of millions of dollars. The companies commonly consist of 50% professional fundraisers, 50 percent experts in publicity, and the rest scientists and engineers. So many of these companies promise to be able to upscale to gigaton per year scales, that if such claims are to be believed global warming will soon be solved.
But can any of these claims be believed? Unlikely. Most of these start-ups have ignored basic facts of the global carbon cycle. Whereas it is cheap and easy to grow trees or seaweed, these also decompose rapidly after death liberating the captured CO2. Whereas it is easy to capture CO2 in seawater, it just as easily exsolved back into the atmosphere. What is largely ignored is the volume required for CO2 storage, which is on the order of a cubic kilometer per gigaton of carbon. This huge volume of space is likely only available in the subsurface. It is likely that it is only the major energy companies which have the expertise and political power to inject such quantities of CO2 into the subsurface. It seems, likely, therefore, that although some of the large number of CCS startup companies will make its creators rich, it the energy industry and their vast ability to uoscale, which likely holds the key to solving global warming.
The global scientific community has focused efforts on carbon capture and storage (CCS) for at least 29 years following the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which came into force on 21 March 1994. Nevertheless, despite 29 years of efforts negligible carbon storage is occurring at present. Of the ~40 gigatons of anthropogenic carbon emitted to the atmosphere in 2020, ~40 megatons of carbon, or less than 0.1% were captured and stored. Of the ~40 megatons of carbon captured and stored ~90% was through enhanced oil recovery. Life cycle analysis shows that current CO2 promoted enhanced oil recovery methods emit more CO2 that they store. The net mass of CO2 captured and stored ignoring enhanced oil recovery was on the order of 4 megatons in 2020, less than 0.01% of the corresponding anthroprogenic flux.
Much of the early scientific early effort took account of the natural carbon cycle, which has been efficient at moderating atmospheric carbon concentrations and global temperature over geologic times. Carbon dioxide is short-lived in the atmosphere. The average half-life of CO2 in the atmosphere is ~4 years. Roughly one eight of the carbon in the atmosphere circulates in and out of the oceans and in and out of the biosphere annually. The atmosphere is also a relatively small CO2 reservoir. The 800 gigatons of carbon in the atmosphere is dwarfed by the ~2,000 gigatons of carbon in the biosphere, the ~40,000 gigatons of carbon in the oceans and the >90,000,000 tons of carbon in the Earth’s crust, largely as carbonate minerals. These facts suggested the transfer of carbon from the atmosphere to one of these larger reservoirs could readily solve global warming. This led initial research into assessing forestry, increasing ocean alkalinity, and injecting carbon into the subsurface.
Relatively little was done to find industrial solutions until recently when public and government action threatened to 1) impose restrictions on and 2) provide financial motivation to limit carbon emission to the atmosphere. The potential financial rewards due have motivated the creation of hundreds of start-up companies to be created, many raising hundreds of millions of dollars. The companies commonly consist of 50% professional fundraisers, 50 percent experts in publicity, and the rest scientists and engineers. So many of these companies promise to be able to upscale to gigaton per year scales, that if such claims are to be believed global warming will soon be solved.
But can any of these claims be believed? Unlikely. Most of these start-ups have ignored basic facts of the global carbon cycle. Whereas it is cheap and easy to grow trees or seaweed, these also decompose rapidly after death liberating the captured CO2. Whereas it is easy to capture CO2 in seawater, it just as easily exsolved back into the atmosphere. What is largely ignored is the volume required for CO2 storage, which is on the order of a cubic kilometer per gigaton of carbon. This huge volume of space is likely only available in the subsurface. It is likely that it is only the major energy companies which have the expertise and political power to inject such quantities of CO2 into the subsurface. It seems, likely, therefore, that although some of the large number of CCS startup companies will make its creators rich, it the energy industry and their vast ability to uoscale, which likely holds the key to solving global warming.