Iceland Is Sucking Carbon Dioxide From the Air and Turning It Into Rock
To battle climate change, firms are experimenting with a radical potential solution.
By Alister Doyle
OSLO, Feb 4 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) On a barren hillside in southwest Iceland, workers are installing huge fans to suck carbon dioxide from the air and turn it to stone deep below ground, in a radical but expensive way to fight global warming.
Engineering fixes for climate change are gaining attention and investments in 2021 as companies such as Microsoft and leaders from China, the United States, and the European Union work on long-term plans to achieve net zero emissions goals.
8 Min Read
OSLO (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - On a barren hillside in southwest Iceland, workers are installing huge fans to suck carbon dioxide from the air and turn it to stone deep below ground, in a radical - but expensive - way to fight global warming.
Engineering fixes for climate change are gaining attention and investments in 2021 as companies such as Microsoft and leaders from China, the United States and the European Union work on long-term plans to achieve “net zero” emissions goals.
Elon Musk, chief of Tesla Inc and a billionaire entrepreneur, said in January he would give a $100 million prize for the best “technology for capturing carbon”.
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Date: 27 May 2021
Progress on UK climate emissions will “run out of steam” without serious action to cut pollution from transport and homes, campaigners have warned.
The warning comes as the latest official figures for UK greenhouse gas emissions show that they fell by 3% in 2019 from the previous year, and are down 44% on 1990 levels.
Much of the reduction has come from the energy supply sector which has seen emissions fall by two-thirds (66%) since 1990 as coal-fired electricity generation plummeted and renewables such as wind power increased.
The shift away from fossil fuel power continues with emissions from energy supplies falling 8% in 2019 alone.
Transport is the biggest emitting sector in the UK, making up more than a quarter (27%) of emissions in 2019, followed by energy supply which accounts for just over a fifth (21%).
That s the equivalent to 9,140 people taking a return flight from Glasgow to New York. The Mossmorran flaring lasted three days from October 4 to 6. Fife Ethylene Plant operator ExxonMobil said at the time that it was committed to minimising carbon dioxide emissions. Greenpeace, which carried out the new Unearthed probe have criticised the government’s failure to get emissions under control and its inadequate plans to move away from oil and gas to meet its climate targets and obligations. The conservation organisation is calling for an end to new oil and gas licensing, shifting instead to a prosperous renewables sector which supports our economy and North Sea workers and communities.