Startup creates Lego-like brick that can store air pollution for centuries
Startup creates Lego-like brick that can store air pollution for centuries
It plans to bury 50,000 tons of carbon dioxide next year.
AKA a tree
Yes but it's wood that you are not allowed to burn or let rot, or the CO₂ gets released again. Basically, cut down trees and store them in oxygen-free water, salt mines, deserts or permafrost areas (or peat bogs, as nature did it over millions of years) where no bacteria/insects will feed on the wood and no humans come to scalp it. There is no way this can be economical, even with today's carbon credits. Trees are "free" solar carbon capture devices but slow and inefficient, and need to be logged-and-stored continuously to work at all, as there is only a very limited space that we can cover in new forests in the next few decades.
I know they just want to find the best use for waste wood but I think there is too little of it in the first place.
I fail to see where those bricks are "LEGO like" in any way. They are rough bricks, not even sufficiently molded to appear regular.
Good point. Where are the studs? How is the clutch power? Are the tolerances on par with existing Lego bricks?
From the picture I'd say that you won't need a caliper to see that their tolerances are nearly as large as the bricks themselves...
taking plant waste from timber companies and farmers, drying it, compressing it, and wrapping it "into Lego-like bricks," and storing it 10 feet underground.
So it's effectively the astronaut ice cream version permafrost?
Immediately I wonder how much the process of transport -> drying -> compressing, wrapping, transporting, and storing + storage site prep and maintenance eats into savings.
the astronaut ice cream version permafrost?
Yeah, that's what it sounds like. I do wonder if 10 feet is deep enough to prevent decomposition in the long term. I seems like converting the plant material to biochar would be a more stable form to trap the carbon in.
transport -> drying -> compressing, wrapping, transporting, and storing + storage site prep and maintenance
I think the key aspect here is that all of these steps are easier to decarbonize than the aviation (difficult) and cement production (almost impossible) processes these bricks are intended to offset.
Yeah, I am skeptical. What would be the energy expenditure of actually storing CO2 into those blocks and what about transporting them? I have a feeling this is like carbon capture plants, great for the headlines, but not really a practical solution.
The problem isn't the inability to make something to do the job, but making it something that you can convince people they'll make a profit from. Nobody wants to clean up pollution unless you either force them to do it or make it profitable.
Their first customer is American Airlines. The airline is paying Graphyte to capture 10,000 tons of CO2 to offset emissions from its planes.
Ah yes, the "We'll pay someone else to be green for us without meaningfully improving our environmental policy" move.
Toss some money away, get a nice tax write-off, and don't bother following up to make sure these supposed CO2 offset numbers are actually what they are advertised to be.
The frustrating part is that the whole idea is great on its face: pay to capture the co2 you generate where they can do so at scale, but this just... clearly doesn't do that.
It's a fantastic idea in principle. We've just neglected the most important ingredient: oversight
I want to eat them. Capture all the pollution in the blocks and I'll eat them. Call me jesus or whatever but really I'm just doing it to prove a point
If you metabolize all the plant matter into carbon dioxide, that would kind of defeat the purpose...
I don't think I will metabolize anything after eating tons of co2. Just put me in a big glass jar and let me celebrate my victory until I'm inevitably taken down.
Is this like nuclear waste that has to be stored in caves? Or can you actually do something constructive with these bricks?
According to the article, this isn't even recapturing CO2. It's grabbing plant/decomposable waste before it rots, turning it into these dense bricks, and burying it under ground. Like, collecting corn husks from farmers. This feels stupid to me and like a big gimmick.
Yep, that sounds dumb. Organic waste should be used for fertilizer.
We're in the golden age of greenwashing. Corporations are horny to show like they are "doing something" for the environment without doing a fucking thing. But it can't be too expensive and have it eat into their bottom line.
Just environmentally conscious enough to win over people who feel guilty for flying (bonus if you can get them to pay) but not so much that your shareholders wonder if you aren't putting their short term interests first.
i imagined that would be the case when i read that its a bill gates thing
How do you get it in there?
How do you get the pollution into the brick? That's what the brick is. Plants capture the CO2 and store it as sugar, and then the plant matter is compressed into a brick and buried instead of burning it for energy or letting it rot.