Word: co2
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Burn almost any kind of organic material - corn husks, hazelnut shells, bamboo and, yes, even chicken manure - in an oxygen-depleted process called pyrolysis, and you generate gases and heat that can be used as energy. What remains is a solid - biochar - that sequesters carbon, keeping CO2 out of the atmosphere. In principle, at least, you create energy in a way that is not just carbon neutral, but carbon negative...
Biochar's ability to sequester CO2 has given new urgency to such research. "Reducing emissions isn't enough - we have to draw down the carbon stock in the atmosphere," says Tim Flannery, chair of the Copenhagen Climate Council, a consortium of scientists and business leaders linked to next year's United Nations Climate Summit. "And for that, slow pyrolysis biochar is a superior solution to anything else that's been proposed." Cornell's Lehmann is even more emphatic. "If biochar could be massively applied around the globe," he says, "we could end the emissions problem in one to two years...
...very important ways. Rare plants and animals, many still undiscovered, depend on the forests - especially the rich rain forests that encircle the earth either side of the equator. When the forests disappear, all that wildlife disappears as well. But trees also contain carbon, and while they live, they absorb CO2 from the atmosphere, compensating in part for the greenhouse gases spewed into the air from cars, power plants and factories. When trees are cut down or burned, that carbon is put back into the atmosphere, accelerating climate change. At least 20% of annual global carbon emissions come from deforestation...
...issue, and if companies don't address it, they will have problems with their license to operate and grow." His business council has been working with most of the leading players in the cement, metals and mining, and electric-utility industries to define specific targets for such things as CO2 emissions and responsible use of fuels and materials that the firms then commit to meet...
...electricity consumption to his own theoretical ones, Lovins’ presentation, “Profitable Solutions to Climate, Oil, and Proliferation,” focused on reducing costs as a means to help the environment. Certain companies, driven by opportunities for increased profit, have shown that cutting back CO2 emissions is possible, he said. IBM and STMicroelectronics were able to cut their emissions by 6 percent while looking for ways to reduce costs. Similarly, when the Dow Chemical Company invested in efficiency rather than buy more fuel, it ended up with a $3.3 billion profit. From a consumer?...