Speaker 1: Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to
Speaker 1: Forward Thinking. Hey there, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the
Speaker 1: podcast that looks at the future and says we will
Speaker 1: we will rock you. I'm Jonathan Strick and I'm Joe McCormick.
Speaker 1: You always astound me. You take us to new depths
Speaker 1: of shame and misery. There's so many songs that have
Speaker 1: rock or stone in them, and that pertains to what
Speaker 1: we are going to talk about today, but I decided
Speaker 1: to choose the most obvious one. So obviously we're talking
Speaker 1: about the future of stone tools. Yeah, I think they're
Speaker 1: really going to make a comeback. Let me tell you
Speaker 1: is where it's at. Guys, if you're not on the
Speaker 1: bronze train, you are really missing out. Actually very fashionable
Speaker 1: these days. Well, why are we going to be talking
Speaker 1: about box today? So we wanted to look into a
Speaker 1: strategy for dealing with carbon dioxide emissions. Now, as I'm
Speaker 1: sure our listeners are aware, carbon dioxide is a one
Speaker 1: of several greenhouse gases, right is It's the primary one
Speaker 1: that is created by the activity of that we humans
Speaker 1: tend to undertake throughout the world. Uh, And so there's
Speaker 1: been a lot of discussion about reducing carbon dioxide emissions,
Speaker 1: but not just not just that, how can we deal
Speaker 1: with the carbon dioxide emissions we're currently generating? Is there
Speaker 1: anything we could do to offset that in any way?
Speaker 1: And one of the possible ways we could do that
Speaker 1: is by mineralizing carbon dioxides. So we wanted to kind
Speaker 1: of take a look at that. What does that entail,
Speaker 1: why is it important in the first place, and what
Speaker 1: are the possibilities for the future. So first we should
Speaker 1: kind of just cover the ground about carbon dioxide, it's
Speaker 1: role as a greenhouse gas, What does that actually mean?
Speaker 1: How does that affect us? Yeah, because when we say
Speaker 1: that it's the primary greenhouse gas according to the Environmental
Speaker 1: Protection Agency, it accounts for of the greenhouse gases in
Speaker 1: our in or the greenhouse gas emissions in the United States.
Speaker 1: And it's not necessarily the most potent greenhouse gas, but
Speaker 1: it's the most important important because it's the most abundant. Right.
Speaker 1: So you can look at different greenhouse gases and you'll
Speaker 1: see that different ones may absorb, first of all, greenhouse gas,
Speaker 1: it creates the greenhouse effect, right, this idea of retaining
Speaker 1: heat close to the Earth, which is a natural part
Speaker 1: of what happens in our atmosphere, and if we didn't
Speaker 1: have it, we would not be doing so well. Right.
Speaker 1: We need we need some of that greenhouse effect in
Speaker 1: order to retain heat and make the planet habitable and
Speaker 1: let plants do stuff, you know, things like that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so it's not like we don't want any greenhouse gas,
Speaker 1: but we have too much of it exactly. So the
Speaker 1: Industrial revolution we have been accidentally geoengineering our planet by
Speaker 1: changing the balance of dispersed gases in the atmosphere, increasing
Speaker 1: the ratio of these carbon based gases that increase the
Speaker 1: greenhouse effect, trapping more heat, warming the surface of the planet,
Speaker 1: melting ice, changing ecosystems, killing species, changing weather patterns. It's
Speaker 1: obvious at this point you know why this matters, right,
Speaker 1: And it's definitely an industrial issue. It's it's it's not
Speaker 1: happening because of the pasta we're eating. Um, it's it's
Speaker 1: it's it's because of like pre industrial society. Of course,
Speaker 1: they weren't taking detailed molecular readings on the atmosphere at
Speaker 1: that point. But but researchers think that that we've seen
Speaker 1: CEO two levels increased by what since pre industrial times. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're talking about thirty billion tons of carbon dioxide released
Speaker 1: from human activities every year. Yeah. And and there are
Speaker 1: ways of knowing what the carbon dooc side levels in
Speaker 1: the atmosphere were like before industrial times. For example, you
Speaker 1: can look at ancient ice cores or sediment cores. They
Speaker 1: are all kinds of ways of looking for clues about
Speaker 1: what the atmosphere was like in the past. Right, And
Speaker 1: and carbon dioxide has a cycle where it can be
Speaker 1: removed from the atmosphere. But we're seeing a real problem
Speaker 1: and that not only are we dumping more carbon dioxide
Speaker 1: into the atmosphere, we're removing a lot of the carbon
Speaker 1: dioxide sinks where we would normally see some of that
Speaker 1: CEO to get reabsorbed into the cycle where it's not
Speaker 1: it's no longer in the atmosphere, all right. When you've
Speaker 1: got a lot of trees around, they're pulling carbon dioxide
Speaker 1: out of the air and turning it into more tree.
Speaker 1: But when you have people cutting down a whole lot
Speaker 1: of forests in order to do very important things to
Speaker 1: be fair, uh, you just have less of that carbon
Speaker 1: capture going on. That an amazing thing to think about.
Speaker 1: You walk through a forest and you think where did
Speaker 1: the mass of these trees come from? Mostly it came
Speaker 1: from the air, air, and water. So that Yeah, the
Speaker 1: primary atoms that are making up the cells of these
Speaker 1: trees are carbon, and the carbon came from carbon dioxide
Speaker 1: that was in the atmosphere. It's it's a phenomenal thing
Speaker 1: to think about. And beyond that, you know there's carbon
Speaker 1: trapped in other ways too. I mean, you know you
Speaker 1: hear about like coal burning coal and that releases carbon dioxide.
Speaker 1: Well before that, the carbon dioxide was part of the coal.
Speaker 1: It was captured, it was it was in a form
Speaker 1: that was not going to leak out and escape into
Speaker 1: the atmosphere on its own. Oh so I wonder if
Speaker 1: we could do something about our problem with an excess
Speaker 1: of atmospheric carbon dioxide by just making that into more coal. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you mean, like kind of reversing the process. Can't we
Speaker 1: get all that stuff and make some rocks, like smush
Speaker 1: it together really hard, mineralizing it essentially? The basic technical
Speaker 1: about it, I guess mineralizing share The basic answer to
Speaker 1: your question is we can. We can kind of do
Speaker 1: that thing. It's not so much as making coal as
Speaker 1: it is finding a method to convert CEO two from
Speaker 1: the gas form into a mineral form. But it's actually
Speaker 1: I hesitate to use the word easy. It's it's simple
Speaker 1: in the fact that it does not require, uh, a
Speaker 1: huge number of steps, right, not a processing It's simple
Speaker 1: in theory and in practice it's hard, sure and well
Speaker 1: and mostly just expensive to get started. Um. But we'd
Speaker 1: like to talk to you guys today specifically about this
Speaker 1: one research project that's been going on in Iceland that
Speaker 1: recently published some really interesting results that they've had. And
Speaker 1: the story came in from a listener of the Now
Speaker 1: podcast by the name of Patrick. Thank you Patrick, UM
Speaker 1: And yeah, yeah, so it's it's about this team of
Speaker 1: icelandic American and French researchers who are working together in
Speaker 1: Iceland because Iceland happens to have an area conditions that
Speaker 1: are just so extremely well suited to their work. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It turns out that this uh, it's kind of like
Speaker 1: a pilot project, and that pilot project is it's located
Speaker 1: in pretty much the perfect spot to test out this
Speaker 1: particular approach. UH. And we'll get into more details and
Speaker 1: explain why it's so ideal. But let's talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about this team. Uh, well, we should mention the
Speaker 1: paper itself. Yes, the name of the so the paper
Speaker 1: was published in Science in June right around but yeah,
Speaker 1: it was called rapid Carbon Mineralization for Permanent Disposal of
Speaker 1: anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions. And I'm guessing that the operative
Speaker 1: word in the title there is rapid because as you said,
Speaker 1: we can. We can turn c O two into minerals.
Speaker 1: We have the power to do that. But I'm guessing
Speaker 1: it's not easy and it's not quick. Well, I mean it,
Speaker 1: it happens naturally over time. But by over time we're
Speaker 1: talking like spans of thousands of years. Now. On a
Speaker 1: geological scale, that's nothing. Yeah, that's fine, but for we humans,
Speaker 1: that's a darn long time. We want things to be changed. Now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's tough to say, like, hey, the improvements we're
Speaker 1: gonna make, we're not going to see any results from that.
Speaker 1: But people or people like things in a thousand years
Speaker 1: will totally enjoy our effort. The crab monsters that take
Speaker 1: over this planet will benefit greatly from our efforts. And
Speaker 1: we we can't even wait to to make an entire
Speaker 1: box of macaroni and cheese we need easy MAC what
Speaker 1: is the MAC version of carbonization? So the expert who
Speaker 1: is sort of the the head of this, or at
Speaker 1: least the person who has often been associated with it,
Speaker 1: is your mater, and mater has been seen like his
Speaker 1: work has seen not just here in this particular instance,
Speaker 1: this Iceland project, there's also a project in the United
Speaker 1: States I'll talk about a little bit later that he
Speaker 1: consulted on. So he's definitely at the forefront of this
Speaker 1: this sort of research and this methodology. And so his
Speaker 1: whole um hypothesis was that we could use a particular
Speaker 1: approach to speed up the natural cycle of carbon dioxide.
Speaker 1: You could make it turn into a mineral much more
Speaker 1: quickly using a specific methodology. Now, what he was looking
Speaker 1: at was a type of carbon capture and storage or
Speaker 1: carbon capture and sequestration, that's CCS. You'll see that term
Speaker 1: pretty frequently. Sequestration. Isn't that such a euphemistic sounding word.
Speaker 1: It's like when you you send somebody to prison, you're
Speaker 1: just sequestering them. Well, you know, I it's funny because
Speaker 1: when I think of the word, the first thing that
Speaker 1: pops in my mind, even though it's not necessarily ever
Speaker 1: used in that context is how do we deal with
Speaker 1: nuclear waste? Right? The idea of of not just capturing it,
Speaker 1: but putting it away where it cannot harm people. Uh.
Speaker 1: In this case, we're talking about trying to capture carbon
Speaker 1: dioxide and locking it in a form where it's not
Speaker 1: going to leak back out into the atmosphere. That that
Speaker 1: was a chief concern in all of these different approaches
Speaker 1: that people have been trying with ccs. How can you
Speaker 1: capture carbon dioxide and converted into a form that is
Speaker 1: uh economically viable In other words, it's not gonna cost
Speaker 1: so much to do it that no one is ever
Speaker 1: going to put forth the money to actually go forward
Speaker 1: with a project. How can it be easy and safe
Speaker 1: enough so that you don't have to worry about putting
Speaker 1: anyone in danger as a result of this um And
Speaker 1: how can it be effective so that you're not just
Speaker 1: having c O two leak right back into the atmosphere
Speaker 1: despite your efforts. Even if that's a small percentage, it's
Speaker 1: still a problem. Right If you say, well, this approach
Speaker 1: is only six effective because the CEO two goes back
Speaker 1: in the atmosphere, then you're you're looking at not good
Speaker 1: return exactly exactly this this benefit of are we actually
Speaker 1: better off using this approach than we would be if
Speaker 1: we tried something else, like just reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
Speaker 1: So the approach they used specifically in this case was
Speaker 1: dissolving carbon dioxide into water, So you get busy water
Speaker 1: essentially carbonated water essentially, and then injecting that carbonated water
Speaker 1: into basaltic rock basaltic rock. You say, yeah, well, here,
Speaker 1: here's the thing. Basaltic rock is porous, Okay, pockets, It's
Speaker 1: got a little pockets in it, so you can inject
Speaker 1: those pockets with this, uh, this carbon dioxide water solution,
Speaker 1: and then you end up getting a chemical reaction. Basalt
Speaker 1: also has stuff like calcium and magnesium in it, so
Speaker 1: you get this CEO two solution reacting with that, and
Speaker 1: eventually that mineralizes into what is essentially limestone. And limestone
Speaker 1: is very stable. You don't have to worry about that
Speaker 1: breaking down and releasing carbon dioxide right back into the
Speaker 1: atmosphere um and it locks it away. You can. As
Speaker 1: soon as that mineralizes, you're good to go. The question
Speaker 1: is how long will it take for the CEO too
Speaker 1: to actually undergo this process? Now? There have been people
Speaker 1: who before this project was underway, we're guessing that that
Speaker 1: would be a matter of decades that you would be
Speaker 1: pumping water into the basalt, and maybe twenty years you
Speaker 1: might see a good return, like a decent percentage of
Speaker 1: that would be mineralized. But that turns out to be
Speaker 1: way too pessimistic, because according to Mater and his work
Speaker 1: over in Iceland, they saw that more than of the
Speaker 1: c O two they had pumped into the basalt as
Speaker 1: a pilot project had mineralized in just two years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like like so much of it. It is a remarkable return,
Speaker 1: something that suggests that this approach could be an incredible
Speaker 1: um option for certain situations. And we'll get into why that's.
Speaker 1: You know, I have to put that qualifiers. It's not
Speaker 1: it's not perfect, but but it is still an exciting development,
Speaker 1: especially because of the scale of it. It's not like
Speaker 1: they took like like three said, and tried to do
Speaker 1: something like it and blow into a paper bag and shove.
Speaker 1: That's a little bit more more involved in light the
Speaker 1: bag on fire and put it on your doors and
Speaker 1: knock on your door and run away. And it wasn't
Speaker 1: was knock knock, it's climate change, the classic scientific prank. Um,
Speaker 1: No that it was. It was not that case. So
Speaker 1: I mentioned earlier that this particular project was kind of
Speaker 1: an ideal realization of this approach, and here's what I
Speaker 1: mean by that. First, the project is co located with
Speaker 1: a geothermal energy plant in Iceland that is on top
Speaker 1: of basaltic rock. Right, so you've already got the stuff
Speaker 1: you need right there. Iceland is essentially made of basaltic rock, yeah,
Speaker 1: which is not the norm for most areas. And well
Speaker 1: that's part of the reason why we put those qualifiers
Speaker 1: on this approach, but they had a plenty of basalt
Speaker 1: to work with. Is a geothermal plant that also generates
Speaker 1: carbon dioxide. Not all geothermal plants do, but this one does,
Speaker 1: and it's at the tune of forty thousand tons of
Speaker 1: the stuff every year, which is, you know, still low
Speaker 1: compared to other types of power plants. Oh yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: Like if you're looking at a cold power plant, you're
Speaker 1: talking about three point five million tons of carbon dioxide
Speaker 1: per year. But but anything that you can reduce is great, yes,
Speaker 1: And so the important part is that they were they
Speaker 1: had a plant where they could capture the carbon dioxide
Speaker 1: emissions right from the generation, right, so they're capturing it
Speaker 1: at the source from the normal plant, the thermal plant
Speaker 1: also to go out with the net. Yeah. Yeah, a
Speaker 1: couple of ziploc bags and a lot of heart and
Speaker 1: moxi no um. So they had the CEO two source
Speaker 1: right there. But also because it's a geo thermal plant,
Speaker 1: in order for them to access the the heat that
Speaker 1: is at the heart of the production of electricity, the
Speaker 1: plant had to drill bore holes down into the basalt. Well,
Speaker 1: if you're going to inject c O two into basalt,
Speaker 1: you need to drill bore holes down into the rock
Speaker 1: itself so you can pump the water down. So they
Speaker 1: were already bought bar holes. No, no need to spend
Speaker 1: money on all that drilling, right. Yeah. It's it's like, well,
Speaker 1: this is this is perfect because we would have had
Speaker 1: to do this anyway, but they already exist, so we
Speaker 1: don't have to do it ourselves. So they had the
Speaker 1: source of the CEO two, they had the basaltic rock,
Speaker 1: they had the holes they needed. All they really had
Speaker 1: to do at that point. And I again, when I
Speaker 1: say all they really had to do, this is still
Speaker 1: a lot of work, but it's much less than what
Speaker 1: they would have had to do if none of these
Speaker 1: other things existed. No, I think it was easy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they had to dissolve the c O two into water.
Speaker 1: You know, you should really be ashamed of themselves over
Speaker 1: an Icelander. Who knows what else they're doing, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's just a world of mystery to me. I know
Speaker 1: nothing about the place. Uh, you just did, didn't you, Joe?
Speaker 1: What do people do besides pump c O two into
Speaker 1: the rocks over in Iceland, gawk and how beautiful the
Speaker 1: world is, and and eat the best hot dogs on earth?
Speaker 1: They have these hot dogs at every gas station in
Speaker 1: Iceland called pilser that are they're the same everywhere you go,
Speaker 1: not exactly the same, but like the recipes pretty much
Speaker 1: the same, and they're they're cheap and they're awesome. Well,
Speaker 1: now we know while they're not making hot dogs and
Speaker 1: consuming them, they're apparently pumping the c O two into
Speaker 1: the basaltic rock. Their first approach was to try and
Speaker 1: do this with about two fifty tons of c O two,
Speaker 1: and that is from two thousand twelve to two thirteen.
Speaker 1: In two thousand fifteen, once they were able to see
Speaker 1: that this program did appear to be working. They stepped
Speaker 1: it up to five thousand tons of carbon dioxide. So uh,
Speaker 1: that's still obviously a deficit to the amount that's being
Speaker 1: generated just by this one geo thermal plant. They hope
Speaker 1: to hit ten thousand tons by the end of this year.
Speaker 1: Still a deficit because we were talking about forty tho
Speaker 1: tons generated each year. But the progress is very promising,
Speaker 1: and the fact that that CEO two isn't going anywhere
Speaker 1: is a great story. Oh yeah, yeah, it's still and
Speaker 1: again like offsetting any of this is a win. Yes,
Speaker 1: but now we get into the drawbacks. Here's the reason
Speaker 1: why we put a lot of qualifications on this. Now,
Speaker 1: this is not to take anything away from this project.
Speaker 1: I I love to say they should be ashamed. I am.
Speaker 1: I'm kidding very much. No, this is really this is
Speaker 1: really good science, limited by geography and and and and six.
Speaker 1: But still, come on, guys, you could have stepped it up. No, no,
Speaker 1: this this The problem is that this approach, even as
Speaker 1: effective as it is, is very tricky to do in
Speaker 1: most places. Right, Iceland was again the perfect place because
Speaker 1: you had that basaltic rock right there. The real issue
Speaker 1: is that basaltic rock is it's plentiful. It's just not
Speaker 1: plentiful any place where there happens to be, you know,
Speaker 1: dry ground. Yeah, most of it is under the sea floor. Yes,
Speaker 1: So in order for you to access the basalt, you
Speaker 1: would have to drill down into the sea floor, which
Speaker 1: obviously creates other hurdles, other engineering challenges, and increases the
Speaker 1: cost of that solution, right. Uh. Furthermore, it requires a
Speaker 1: whole lot of water to to carry out the process. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So for every ton of c O two, they uh,
Speaker 1: they estimate that it takes twenty five tons of water. Now,
Speaker 1: we've done other episodes of about water, Like we did
Speaker 1: one called Water Water Everywhere, and we did another one
Speaker 1: called the Circle of H two O. Both of those
Speaker 1: published in two thousand thirteen. And you remember, if you
Speaker 1: listen to those episodes, we talked about how water is
Speaker 1: a very precious resource. Fresh water is a very precious resource,
Speaker 1: fresh clean water, I mean. And the issue, of course
Speaker 1: it's complicated, right. The water is not leaving earth, it's
Speaker 1: just not it's just not necessarily in the places where
Speaker 1: people need it. Yeah, yeah, and and that can that
Speaker 1: can become super problematic Also, the ratio of fresh water
Speaker 1: to seawater to saltwater um is not quite what it
Speaker 1: would be nice for us. It's great, great for the fish, Yeah,
Speaker 1: not so much for us necessarily. Yeah, that's that's a
Speaker 1: real issue. And and they and they haven't tested this
Speaker 1: out with seawater, right that it may work with sea water,
Speaker 1: and if it does, that removes that particular problem, or
Speaker 1: at least reduces it. Because another issue is that some
Speaker 1: of the places that would stand to benefit the most
Speaker 1: from this approach have the least access to fresh water
Speaker 1: or at least disposable fresh water. Also, I'm not using
Speaker 1: tons of water today. Yeah, so let's get rid of
Speaker 1: that one ton of c O two. Uh. And and
Speaker 1: also you know if they if those areas aren't located
Speaker 1: near like a like the ocean, and they don't have
Speaker 1: any basaltic rock under the ground in those areas, then
Speaker 1: that that means you have to have transportation, right, You've
Speaker 1: got to transport the CEO two after you've captured it
Speaker 1: to a place where you can then dissolve it in
Speaker 1: water and pump it down into the basalt. I guess
Speaker 1: you transport it in an electric car. I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's but that really that does and and you've got
Speaker 1: to hope the the place that's generating the electricity is
Speaker 1: doing so in a way that isn't dumping yet more
Speaker 1: CEO two in the atmosphere. This shows how complicated this
Speaker 1: problem is, right, that this is a non trivial problem
Speaker 1: in multiple ways, not just in the scale, but also
Speaker 1: how how we can actually tackle it in a way
Speaker 1: that ultimately is hopeful. Now, one thing I do want
Speaker 1: to come back on is that I don't see you.
Speaker 1: Maybe you could explain to me what you're thinking of it.
Speaker 1: I don't see what the problem is. If they can
Speaker 1: use seawater, like I don't think there's really any shortage
Speaker 1: of seawater, and it's not that they wouldn't need to. Well,
Speaker 1: if they can use seawater, that definitely reduces the problem dramatically.
Speaker 1: But for places that are far inland that still have
Speaker 1: a lack of fresh water, that that would still be
Speaker 1: an issue. Right, So you think of like lots of
Speaker 1: mainland China or India, places that may be miles and
Speaker 1: miles away from the closest ocean, and so you still
Speaker 1: are yet right, you still have some real problems there.
Speaker 1: I mean uh. And and also you'd have to watch
Speaker 1: out with anytime you're gathering that much water to use
Speaker 1: it an industrial application, you have to watch out for
Speaker 1: for where that water is coming from and how it's affecting,
Speaker 1: how it's removal is affecting the environ meant that you're
Speaker 1: removing it from CC above reefish you know, like like
Speaker 1: fish probably want some of that. I think we just
Speaker 1: have to accept that here and there, some fish are
Speaker 1: going to get injected into the basaltic rock. It's really
Speaker 1: gonna mess up future. Look at look at the fish
Speaker 1: fossils here. It's not supposed to be there. What's going on? Weird?
Speaker 1: It's almost like almost like people were more fish appeared
Speaker 1: on Earth, forcefully throwing fish into the ground in limestone,
Speaker 1: limestone encrusted fish. They ate very strangely. Oh man, I
Speaker 1: could go for some seafood right now. So one of
Speaker 1: the other things to point out is even if you
Speaker 1: were to have the ideal situation as the project in
Speaker 1: Iceland seems to be, it's still pretty expensive. It's more
Speaker 1: expensive than other methods of carbon injection. Dr Hotter said
Speaker 1: that it costs about seventeen dollars per ton of carbon dioxide,
Speaker 1: whereas other methods range closer to between five and ten
Speaker 1: dollars per ton. So, and that's in Iceland. Obviously, if
Speaker 1: you were to try and build a facility out offshore
Speaker 1: facility that's pushing c O two down into the sea floor,
Speaker 1: that would probably be even more expensive per ton, you
Speaker 1: would imagine, I mean, just the building the infrastructure alone
Speaker 1: would be incredibly expensive. So the question then becomes, does
Speaker 1: it still make financial sense to go with this approach
Speaker 1: versus some other approach? Knowing that the problem is there
Speaker 1: either way, right, we need a solution to the problem.
Speaker 1: Just which solution makes the most sense economically, because we
Speaker 1: can't just ignore that factor. I wish we could, because
Speaker 1: that would be awesome if we didn't have to worry
Speaker 1: about how much stuff costs. Arguably we would have a
Speaker 1: lot more solutions to some of the biggest problems we
Speaker 1: face today. But we do have to worry about that now.
Speaker 1: There's another pilot program am I mentioned this earlier that's
Speaker 1: going on here in the United States, and it's in Wallula, Washington,
Speaker 1: and it's along of basalt deposit on the banks of
Speaker 1: the Columbia River. So we have a similar project underway
Speaker 1: here um and that that project the cost was around
Speaker 1: two point two billion dollars at least that's what the
Speaker 1: estimated cost was when they proposed it. I have no
Speaker 1: idea how much it actually ended up costing. In fact,
Speaker 1: this particular project was a little difficult to research because
Speaker 1: it was one of those that got proposed. It was
Speaker 1: ramping up to go into full on execution. Then the
Speaker 1: cord was plugged. They plugged, the cord was pulled, unplugged,
Speaker 1: the whole thing fell apart, is what I'm trying to say.
Speaker 1: But brain, no work, no more. So the project was defunded, right,
Speaker 1: it was canceled, But then initial work began anyway, A
Speaker 1: and A proposal was written again, and that by two
Speaker 1: thousand thirteen, the pilot pro program was actually working. Now
Speaker 1: that they had started this in the early two thousand's,
Speaker 1: arguing for it, planning for it, getting funding for it,
Speaker 1: and then it got canceled. But in two thousand and
Speaker 1: thirteen it got started again. So we're at a point
Speaker 1: now where we should expect an update for this project,
Speaker 1: but it hasn't. But the website hasn't been updated. I
Speaker 1: couldn't tell. I went to the website and I looked
Speaker 1: for for recent news, and the most recent update I
Speaker 1: could see came from two thousand fourteen, and according to
Speaker 1: what I saw, they said there was no significant carbon
Speaker 1: dioxide leakage from the injection site, which is great news,
Speaker 1: but there was nothing to say, you know what percentage
Speaker 1: of it appears to have been mineralized since they started
Speaker 1: the project. I didn't see any information along those lines,
Speaker 1: so nothing that would verify the Iceland projects results using
Speaker 1: a totally different well not a different approach, but a
Speaker 1: different location. Right, So I'm hoping to see another update,
Speaker 1: and you know, some sometimes this kind of thing happens,
Speaker 1: like like as scientists are gathering the data for their
Speaker 1: research and and pulling it all together, so sometimes you'll
Speaker 1: you'll see drop offs and updates right before they publish something,
Speaker 1: and and it's, yeah, it's It's also possible that it's
Speaker 1: one of those things where you know, they have certain
Speaker 1: staff in charge of updating the website, and who are
Speaker 1: who might turn over. Maybe they are students who have
Speaker 1: graduated and moved on, and it may be that they
Speaker 1: just didn't ever replace those folks to continue that part.
Speaker 1: It may be the project itself is completely on track.
Speaker 1: I just don't know about it. No one would return
Speaker 1: my phone calls, so I didn't call them some anti
Speaker 1: social um. But yeah, I I think it's interesting that
Speaker 1: this is not you know, the Iceland Project is not
Speaker 1: the only place where this is being tasted. It's it's
Speaker 1: great and it's and it's so um inspiring to to
Speaker 1: see this kind of thinking applied to this really massive problem. Right.
Speaker 1: And if it's if it's something that can be scaled
Speaker 1: up and something that can work on a more widespread basis,
Speaker 1: maybe we could see potentially a leveling off of the
Speaker 1: amount of c O two emissions that we uh, like
Speaker 1: the net gain and CEO two emissions we see over
Speaker 1: a year, and possibly even not just a reduction from
Speaker 1: from the fact that we're you know, using less fossil fuels,
Speaker 1: but a reduction because of being able to capture and mineralize. Right.
Speaker 1: And it's certainly not an excuse to leave your lights
Speaker 1: on all night and you know whatever other terrible just
Speaker 1: you know, sitting just burning coal for no reason, sitting
Speaker 1: and sitting in your car with the car on, yeah,
Speaker 1: for seven hours. Uh, I mean, you know, my car
Speaker 1: is a c works really well and it's hot outside.
Speaker 1: Is pretty is really hot outside today. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you all have been out in the middle of
Speaker 1: the day. I try not to be because I walk
Speaker 1: in the morning and in the afternoon, and I don't
Speaker 1: want to go through any more of that than I
Speaker 1: already do. Earlier, I was standing in the sun and
Speaker 1: the it was on my shirt, and my shirt felt
Speaker 1: like a hot stove top. It was just crazy. Yeah. See, now,
Speaker 1: that would be nice if we could reduce some of
Speaker 1: those greenhouse gases and us over time reduce the amount
Speaker 1: of heat. Yeah. So obviously, this whole idea of capturing carbon,
Speaker 1: of reducing the greenhouse gases that we're releasing into the
Speaker 1: atmosphere as wide ranging consequences, you know, the idea of
Speaker 1: of trying to reduce the amount of climate change we
Speaker 1: expect to see over the next several years. Even even
Speaker 1: if we were to get a real good handle on
Speaker 1: this right now, we know that those changes are going
Speaker 1: to continue. It's not like there's just a switch that
Speaker 1: we could flip and then everything of be fine. But
Speaker 1: we do need to take some steps to to at
Speaker 1: least mitigate those effects and potentially decrease the amount of
Speaker 1: time that we will experience, uh, you know, non ideal
Speaker 1: climate in lots of parts of the world. Uh. So
Speaker 1: I'm very much encouraged by this project, even though there
Speaker 1: there are these big limitations that we've pointed out. And
Speaker 1: I've always said that being an optimist, in my view,
Speaker 1: means not just hoping for the best, but also acknowledging
Speaker 1: the challenges that are in the way so that we
Speaker 1: might overcome them and not just become discouraged when we
Speaker 1: encounter them. So here's hoping that this this project continues,
Speaker 1: that's able to scale up even further. Perhaps we're able
Speaker 1: to see related projects in other parts of the world,
Speaker 1: and uh, it might be uh one good strategy for
Speaker 1: dealing with carbon dioxide. I doubt it's ever going to
Speaker 1: become the only or even the primary one, but it
Speaker 1: could would certainly help. Right, it's not it's definitely not
Speaker 1: hurting to capture some of that serio mineralizing. Absolutely, so
Speaker 1: this was really cool. Big thanks again to Patrick who
Speaker 1: wrote into now and and suggested this topic. We don't
Speaker 1: mind appropriating it for ourselves because I mean, we work
Speaker 1: on now so we're fine with taking that stuff. Yeah. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: And uh and if you guys have not checked out
Speaker 1: the Now podcast. Its official title is How Stuff Works Now,
Speaker 1: which is impossible to google, but if you would like
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