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Desert ‘carbon Farming’ To Curb CO2
Desert ‘carbon farming’ to curb CO2
1 August 2013
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By Matt McGrath
Environment correspondent, BBC News
Scientists state that planting great deals of jatropha trees in desert locations might be a reliable method of suppressing emissions of CO2.
Dubbed “carbon farming”, researchers say the concept is financially competitive with state-of-the-art carbon capture and storage jobs.
But critics say the concept could be have unanticipated, negative impacts consisting of driving up food rates.
The research study has actually been released, external in the journal Earth System Dynamics.
Seeds of change
Jatropha curcas is a plant that originated in Central America and is effectively adjusted to severe conditions consisting of extremely dry deserts.
It is currently grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world because its seeds can produce oil.
In this study, German scientists revealed that one hectare of jatropha might catch approximately 25 tonnes of from the environment every year. The researchers based their quotes on trees presently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.
“The results are overwhelming,” said Prof Klaus Becker, from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.
“There was great development, a good response from these plants. I feel there will be no problem trying it on a much larger scale, for instance 10 thousand hectares in the start,” he said.
According to the scientists a plantation that would cover 3 percent of the Arabian desert would soak up all the CO2 produced by cars and trucks in Germany over a 20 year duration.
The scientists say that an important aspect of the strategy would be the accessibility of desalination facilities. This means that at first, any plantations would be restricted to seaside locations.
They are intending to establish bigger trials in desert locations of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker says that unlike other plans that just balance out the carbon that people produce, the planting of jatropha could be a good, brief term service to climate modification.
“I think it is a great concept since we are really drawing out co2 from the environment – and it is entirely different in between drawing out and preventing.”
According to the researcher’s calculations the costs of suppressing co2 via the planting of trees would be in between 42 and 63 euros per tonne. This makes it competitive with other strategies, such as the more high tech carbon capture and storage, external (CCS).
A variety of countries are currently trialling this innovation, external but it has yet to be released commercially.
Growing jatropha not just soaks up CO2 however has other advantages. The plants would help to make desert locations more habitable, and the plant’s seeds can be harvested for biofuel say the scientists, offering an economic return.
“Jatropha is ideal to be developed into biokerosene – it is even much better than biodiesel,” stated Prof Becker.
But other experts in this location are not encouraged. They point to the truth that in 2007 and 2008 great deals of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, specifically in Africa. But a number of these ventures ended in tears,, external as the plants were not very effective in coping with dry conditions.
Lucy Hurn is the biofuels project supervisor for the charity, Actionaid. She states that while jatropha was when seen as the terrific, green hope the reality was extremely various.
“When jatropha was introduced it was seen as a miracle crop, it would grow on scrubland or minimal land,” she said.
“But there are typically people who require marginal land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that location – we wouldn’t class the land as minimal.”
She mentioned that jatropha is highly poisonous and can pollute the land it is grown on, even in a desert. And she also had issues about the fairness of the idea.
“It is still someone else’s land. Why enter and grow these massive plantations to deal with an issue these people didn’t actually trigger?”
Follow Matt on Twitter, external.
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Related internet links
Universität Hohenheim
European Geosciences Union
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