Rocks, Crops, and Climate

[BioHawk]

I just read an article in Scientific American about using crushed basalt spread on corn fields to not only pull significantly more carbon out of the air, but to help increase crop yields for the farmers that do it. They had some very positive results in early tests but it still needs a lot more development. Still, it sounds like a promising technique that if it follows the early testing could make a significant dent in the carbon problem.

Crushed Rocks Could Be the Next Climate Solution

Spreading crushed stone across farm fields could inexpensively pull CO2 from the air while also increasing yields. But it would require a mountain of mining

www.scientificamerican.com

 

[uihawk82]

I just read an article in Scientific American about using crushed basalt spread on corn fields to not only pull significantly more carbon out of the air, but to help increase crop yields for the farmers that do it. They had some very positive results in early tests but it still needs a lot more development. Still, it sounds like a promising technique that if it follows the early testing could make a significant dent in the carbon problem.

Crushed Rocks Could Be the Next Climate Solution

Spreading crushed stone across farm fields could inexpensively pull CO2 from the air while also increasing yields. But it would require a mountain of mining

www.scientificamerican.com

This is a pretty basic chemical reaction of metals like calcium, sodium etc reacting with rain water and CO2. Geologists and geology as a science mentions that during periods of mountain building there was exposure of these types of rock that would react with CO2 and it was noticeble in lower CO2 levels.

The only negative is a lot of petrol fuels are used to mine the and transport the basalt so is it truly a good sink and capture of carbon

 

[BioHawk]

This is a pretty basic chemical reaction of metals like calcium, sodium etc reacting with rain water and CO2. Geologists and geology as a science mentions that during periods of mountain building there was exposure of these types of rock that would react with CO2 and it was noticeble in lower CO2 levels.

The only negative is a lot of petrol fuels are used to mine the and transport the basalt so is it truly a good sink and capture of carbon

Yeah, the article mentions the negative side of mining, preparing, and transporting but it also said the carbon created in that process would still be far, far less than the potential for the amount of carbon sequestered. Obviously more testing is needed to get a better feel for it.

 

[uihawk82]

Yeah, the article mentions the negative side of mining, preparing, and transporting but it also said the carbon created in that process would still be far, far less than the potential for the amount of carbon sequestered. Obviously more testing is needed to get a better feel for it.

Have you heard the news reports of the deepest ice core ever being completed? Iirc, over a mile down in Antarctica to bedrock and a core covering around 1 million years at early estimates because as they bring up new sections of the core they can count the yearly layers. The first finding are that CO2 and methane were at pretty low levels at that time. And iirc other geologic and proxy measurements tell of a pretty cool/cold climate back then

 

[BioHawk]

Have you heard the news reports of the deepest ice core ever being completed? Iirc, over a mile down in Antarctica to bedrock and a core covering around 1 million years at early estimates because as they bring up new sections of the core they can count the yearly layers. The first finding are that CO2 and methane were at pretty low levels at that time. And iirc other geologic and proxy measurements tell of a pretty cool/cold climate back then

I haven't seen that although a million years ago was probably in an ice age so it wouldn't be surprising that it was cooler. I don't remember the exact time span of ice ages though.