Filed under: Environmental | Tags: Biomass, Carbon Capture, Climate Change, Energy
The Independent has reported on ancient method on enriching the soil could provide yet another solution to the issue of energy production and climate change. Scientists plan on using this technique to create energy from biomass while simultaneously trapping the CO2 in the the remaining charcoal to be trapped in the soil for centuries. This will simultaneously enrich the soil for growing more vegetation.
“They aim to grow trees and plants to absorb CO2 and then trap the carbon by turning the resulting biomass into ‘biochar’, a fine-grained form of charcoal that can be buried in the soil, keeping it safely locked up for thousands of years.
The pre-Columbian Indians used biochar to make the poor soils of the rainforest – which otherwise quickly become exhausted – productive for harvest after harvest. It is still there today, many hundreds of years later, forming islands of black fertile earth in the otherwise unpromising ground.
But it is now being widely cited as a possible solution to global warming by scientists shocked at how climate change is taking place much faster than predicted and convinced that the world must now start not just rapidly to reduce CO2 emissions, but to get the greenhouse gas out of the air.”
This three pronged approach to carbon reduction, energy creation, and soil enrichment has huge potential.
Good ole’ Doc Brown (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjCRUvX2D0E&feature=related) It’s a little bit more (around 1.3GW) energy pouring through every square kilometer of space around the earth every second. Isaac Asimov, of course, wrote about harnessing these solar waves and sending them to earth through microwaves. While using current technology would not make this a financially viable source of energy, costing around 50 cents per kilowatt hour, three things make this potentially possible, and profitable, for the future.
1) Geopolitical interest is piqued and international collaboration would allow the cost to be more evenly distributed. 2) Advances in robotics and computing are constantly changing the face, and abilities, of these machines, making them more reliable and efficient. 3) The entrepreneurs now interested in space travel will make the costs of space travel and transport affordable.
While this remains an exceptionally weak signal, the prospects are more promising than ever.
www.economist.com/science/tq/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12673299&CFID=33924590&CFTOKEN=53944839
from tree hugger]
“Is Mother Nature calling it quits? Along with the baffling collapse of bee populations worldwide to other strange natural phenomena, we can now add the bizarre disappearance of acorns in widespread areas along the eastern seaboard – Virginia, Pennsylvania, Nova Scotia, and even as far away as the Midwest.
“I’m used to seeing so many acorns around and out in the field, it’s something I just didn’t believe,” says Rod Simmons, a field botantist based in Arlington, Virginia, where at this time of year, acorns are usually everywhere – either underfoot or falling from oaks. “But this is not just not a good year for oaks. It’s a zero year. There’s zero production. I’ve never seen anything like this before.”
He wasn’t the only one who noticed this odd occurrence:
“Simmons and Arlington naturalists began calling around. A naturalist in Maryland found no acorns on an Audubon nature walk there. Ditto for Fairfax, Falls Church, Charles County, even as far away as Pennsylvania. There are no acorns falling from the majestic oaks in Arlington National Cemetery.
“Once I started paying attention, I couldn’t find any acorns anywhere. Not from white oaks, red oaks or black oaks, and this was supposed to be their big year,” said Greg Zell, a naturalist at Long Branch Nature Center in Arlington. “We’re talking zero. Not a single acorn. It’s really bizarre.”
Zell began to do some research. He found Internet discussion groups, including one on Topix called “No acorns this year,” reporting the same thing from as far away as the Midwest up through New England and Nova Scotia. “We live in Glenwood Landing, N.Y., and don’t have any acorns this year. Really weird,” wrote one. “None in Kansas either! Curiouser and curiouser.” (from Washington Post)”
It’s strange because oaks in other areas are overproducing, yet in these areas, oaks (which are self-pollinating) seem to be on reproductive strike, despite dropping an overabundance of acorns last year. Plenty of animals will starve this time around. Is it climate change or could it be the extreme opposite of a natural boom-and-bust cycle?”
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/12/mysterious-disappearing-acorns.php
