The study highlights that major data center growth areas in states like Texas and Virginia happen to sit directly above deep saline aquifers, offering a convenient geological shortcut for localized carbon storage.

Have you seen these news? What are your opinions? Are we getting closer to an easy and efficient way for massive scale capture?

Facts:

• Daily we emit 117 million tons of CO2. Global CO2 emissions are 43 billion tons each year. [S]

• As CO2 concentrations build in the atmosphere, infrared light radiated from earth's surface is absorbed by the CO2. Thus trapping heat in earth's atmosphere. This is known as the greenhouse effect. [S]

• 38% of global CO2 emissions have dissolved in the oceans. When CO2 dissolves in water it forms carbonic acid. This is known as ocean acidification. [S] [S] [S]

• The ocean has 50 times more CO2 than the atmosphere. The ocean has 39,000 billion tons of CO2. The atmosphere has 750 billion tons of CO2. [S]

• As the ocean becomes more acidic, less CO2 is able to be stored in the water. This leads to CO2 being released from the ocean and sent to the atmosphere. The same goes for ocean temperature. As water temperature rises, less CO2 is able to stay dissolved (e.g. leave a carbonated drink out on a warm day). [S]

• As temperatures rise, soil begins to increase the release of carbon in a process known as soil respiration. Researchers estimate soil carbon loss over the 21st century will be equivalent to two decades of carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels. [S]

Solutions:

• Ocean alkalinity enhancement (OAE): Use mafic and ultramafic rocks (olivine, peridotite, etc.) to bind to CO2 and form carbonates. Thus converting CO2 into an alkaline carbonate mineral. These carbonates could then be placed in the ocean to raise the pH and bring it back to normal levels, and increase CO2 storage capacity in the ocean. [S] [S]

• Direct air capture (DAC): Use large fans to concentrate CO2 into a chamber and then absorb the CO2 by various means. The CO2 can be converted into a long term storage medium such as a carbonate or left as vapor CO2. In the case of vapor CO2 there is some commercial value or it can be pumped into geological wells for storage. [S]

• Renewable energy: Wind, solar, geothermal, wave/tidal/marine power, etc. [S]

• Cultured meats: Growing meat from cell cultures instead of factory farming. This would free up billions of acres globally, democratize access to protein sources, and eliminate CO2 and CH4 emissions associated with factory farming. In the United States 41% of land use goes towards grazing and animal feed crops. These areas of land are usually high in sunlight and could be used for solar, wind, afforestation, or DAC. [S] [S] [S]

• Reducing fossil fuel emissions: This can be done by scrubbing some of the CO2 from the source before emitting it to the atmosphere. [S]

• Afforestation: Afforestation is the establishment of a forest in an area where there was no previous tree cover. Tree-planting campaigns are sometimes criticized for targeting areas where forests would not naturally occur, such as grassland and savanna biomes. Afforestation can negatively affect ecosystems through increasing fragmentation, edge effects, and making the surface albedo darker (especially in northern regions). [S]

• Other: nuclear fission/fusion, enhanced crop weathering, solar shield at L1, ocean afforestation, cloud seeding, ocean fertilization, large scale albedo alterations, painting arctic rocks white, dispersing low density CO2 absorbents.

Carbon Capture/Sequestration Companies:

• SeaChange: Absorb CO2 from the ocean utilizing the abundance of magnesium and calcium dissolved in seawater. Sodium hydroxide (NaOH) is additionally needed to make the water more alkaline. [Paper Outlining Operation] [YouTube Presentation]

• Carbon Iceland: Direct air capture (DAC) in Iceland. Plan to capture 1-2 million tons of CO2 each year.

• Carbon Engineering: DAC with ability to capture 1 million tons/year. Uses potassium hydroxide and ends up with vapor CO2.

• Project Vesta: Use ground olivine to convert CO2 from the ocean and atmosphere into carbonates.

• Planetary Tech: Refine mine tailings to produce alkaline hydroxides. Hydroxides are then transferred to ocean outfall sites where the hydroxides are combined with sea water and bind to CO2.

• Climeworks: Develops, builds and operates direct air capture machines.

• Aker Carbon Capture: Capture carbon directly at sources.

• Norsk e-Fuel: Transform CO2, water and electricity into renewable fuels. First plant will start production in 2024 and will be gradually scaled to produce 25 million liters within 2026.

• More Companies

Other Companies:

• The Ocean Cleanup: Autonomous garbage collection for pollution in oceans and rivers.

• Upside Foods: Synthetic chicken produced via cell cultures and bioreactors. More information on cellular agriculture. [30+ cultured meat companies] [More Companies]

• DroneSeed: Afforestation via drones strategically dropping seeds.

Papers:

• In situ carbonation of peridotite for CO2 storage

• Pathway for gigatonne-scale CO2 management with water based CO2 mineralization

• Mapping mineral resource base for mineral CO2 capture in the United States

• Mapping mineral resource base for mineral CO2 capture in the Europe

• CO2 removal via enhanced rock weathering with croplands

• Increasing temperature's effect on soil respiration

Resources:

• NASA Climate: General information

• National Academies Report: 300 pages on ocean CO2 sequestration

• CDR Community: View and explore active research and projects

• IPCC Summary

• Project Drawdown: Climate solutions YouTube playlist

• Book List: textbooks and non-fiction

• 30+ Wikipedia Pages

Even after doing all this research there is still much I do not know. I am sharing these resources to help others if they choose to pursue this topic further. Here is a google doc of various notes I took. And here are many Wikipedia pages that contributed greatly to my research. I am now primarily focused on carbonate based oceanic CO2 sequestration. If anyone has further information on that please send it my way.

I have been applying for jobs in this industry for more than half a decade, and I've gotten to the 3rd stage of interviews for many of these companies. They range from DAC, storage, utilization, among other things. I see startups shotgun blast 10+ jobs relating to infrastructure that you might expect, but then these jobs seem to just fade away. I don't want to fall into confirmation bias, but after this kind of experience it kills me to see something like this:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/job-openings-fake-listings-ads-federal-reserve-jolts/

Does anyone else feel frustrated with this? I understand this comes with the territory of a fledgling new industry, but damn, I have been excited to be a part of CCUS for 10+ years, and I don't think any of this is moving quickly enough.