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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 reporter, BBC News
Scientists say that planting great deals of jatropha trees in desert areas might be an effective way of suppressing emissions of CO2.
Dubbed “carbon farming”, scientists say the idea is economically competitive with state-of-the-art carbon capture and storage jobs.
But critics state the concept could be have unexpected, unfavorable effects consisting of increasing food prices.
The research study has actually been released, external in the journal Earth System Dynamics.
Seeds of change
Jatropha curcas is a plant that came from Central America and is effectively adjusted to conditions including very dry deserts.
It is currently grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world since its seeds can produce oil.
In this study, German scientists revealed that one hectare of jatropha could capture approximately 25 tonnes of carbon dioxide from the environment every year. The scientists based their estimates on trees presently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.
“The outcomes are overwhelming,” stated Prof Klaus Becker, from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.
“There was excellent development, a great action from these plants. I feel there will be no issue attempting it on a much bigger scale, for example 10 thousand hectares in the beginning,” he stated.
According to the researchers 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 period.
The scientists state that a crucial component of the plan would be the availability of desalination centers. This indicates that initially, any plantations would be confined to coastal locations.
They are hoping to establish larger trials in desert locations of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker says that unlike other schemes that just balance out the carbon that individuals produce, the planting of jatropha might be a great, brief term option to climate modification.
“I believe it is a good concept because we are really drawing out co2 from the environment – and it is completely different in between extracting and avoiding.”
According to the scientist’s computations the expenses of suppressing co2 through 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 number of nations are presently trialling this innovation, external however it has yet to be released commercially.
Growing jatropha not only soaks up CO2 but has other benefits. The plants would help to make desert areas more habitable, and the plant’s seeds can be gathered for biofuel state the scientists, providing an economic return.
“Jatropha is perfect to be developed into biokerosene – it is even much better than biodiesel,” stated Prof Becker.
But other professionals in this area are not persuaded. They point to the reality that in 2007 and 2008 large numbers of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, specifically in Africa. But much of these endeavors ended in tears,, external as the plants were not extremely effective in coping with dry conditions.
Lucy Hurn is the biofuels project supervisor for the charity, Actionaid. She says that while jatropha was as soon as seen as the terrific, green hope the reality was extremely different.
“When jatropha was introduced it was seen as a wonder crop, it would grow on scrubland or marginal land,” she said.
“But there are frequently people who require limited land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that location – we would not class the land as limited.”
She explained that jatropha is highly poisonous and can contaminate 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 go in and grow these huge plantations to deal with an issue these individuals didn’t in fact trigger?”
Follow Matt on Twitter, external.
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Related internet links
Universität Hohenheim
European Geosciences Union
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