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Desert 'carbon Farming' To Curb CO2
Desert 'carbon farming' to suppress CO2
1 August 2013
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By Matt McGrath
Environment reporter, BBC News
Scientists state that planting great deals of jatropha trees in desert locations could be an efficient way of suppressing emissions of CO2.
Dubbed "carbon farming", researchers say the concept is financially competitive with modern carbon capture and storage jobs.
But critics state the idea could be have unpredicted, negative effects consisting of increasing food rates.
The research has actually been released, external in the journal Earth System Dynamics.
Seeds of change
Jatropha curcas is a plant that came from in Central America and is really well adapted to severe conditions consisting of extremely arid deserts.
It is already grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world due to the fact that its seeds can produce oil.
In this study, German researchers showed that one hectare of jatropha might capture approximately 25 tonnes of co2 from the atmosphere every year. The researchers based their estimates on trees currently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.
"The results are frustrating," stated Prof Klaus Becker, from the of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.
"There was great growth, a great reaction from these plants. I feel there will be no issue trying it on a much bigger scale, for instance 10 thousand hectares in the start," he said.
According to the scientists a plantation that would cover 3 percent of the Arabian desert would take in all the CO2 produced by automobiles and trucks in Germany over a twenty years duration.
The scientists say that a critical element of the plan would be the availability of desalination facilities. This implies that at first, any plantations would be confined to seaside areas.
They are intending to establish bigger trials in desert areas of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker states that unlike other plans that simply balance out the carbon that individuals produce, the planting of jatropha might be an excellent, short-term service to climate change.
"I think it is a great idea due to the fact that we are truly drawing out carbon dioxide from the environment - and it is entirely different between drawing out and avoiding."
According to the scientist's estimations the costs of curbing co2 via the planting of trees would be between 42 and 63 euros per tonne. This makes it competitive with other methods, such as the more high tech carbon capture and storage, external (CCS).
A variety of countries are currently trialling this technology, external however it has yet to be deployed commercially.
Growing jatropha not just absorbs CO2 however has other advantages. The plants would help to make desert locations more habitable, and the plant's seeds can be collected for biofuel state the researchers, supplying a financial return.
"Jatropha is ideal to be developed into biokerosene - it is even much better than biodiesel," said Prof Becker.
But other specialists in this area are not convinced. They indicate the reality that in 2007 and 2008 great deals of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, particularly in Africa. But much of these ventures ended in tears,, external as the plants were not extremely effective in handling dry conditions.
Lucy Hurn is the biofuels campaign supervisor for the charity, Actionaid. She states that while jatropha was as soon as seen as the terrific, green hope the truth was extremely various.
"When jatropha was presented it was viewed as a miracle crop, it would grow on scrubland or limited land," she stated.
"But there are typically people who require minimal land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that location - we would not class the land as marginal."
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 handle an issue these people didn't actually cause?"
Follow Matt on Twitter, external.
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Related internet links
Universität Hohenheim
European Geosciences Union
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