Desert ‘carbon Farming’ To Curb CO2

Desert ‘carbon farming’ to suppress CO2

1 August 2013

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By Matt McGrath

Environment correspondent, BBC News

Scientists state that planting great deals of jatropha trees in desert areas might be an effective method of curbing emissions of CO2.

Dubbed “carbon farming”, scientists state the concept is economically competitive with high-tech carbon capture and storage projects.

But critics say the idea could be have unexpected, unfavorable effects including increasing food costs.

The research study has been published, external in the journal Earth System Dynamics.

Seeds of change

Jatropha curcas is a plant that came from Central America and is effectively adjusted to severe conditions including very arid deserts.

It is already grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world because its seeds can produce oil.

In this research study, German researchers revealed that a person hectare of jatropha could record approximately 25 tonnes of co2 from the atmosphere every year. The researchers based their price quotes on trees currently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.

“The outcomes are overwhelming,” said Prof Klaus Becker, from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.

“There was good development, an excellent response from these plants. I feel there will be no issue trying it on a much bigger scale, for instance ten thousand hectares in the beginning,” he said.

According to the scientists a plantation that would cover three percent of the Arabian desert would soak up all the CO2 by cars and trucks in Germany over a twenty years duration.

The scientists state that a vital aspect of the plan would be the availability of desalination facilities. This means that at first, any plantations would be confined to seaside locations.

They are wanting to establish bigger trials in desert locations of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker says that unlike other schemes that simply balance out the carbon that people produce, the planting of jatropha might be a great, brief term solution to environment modification.

“I believe it is a good idea due to the fact that we are actually drawing out carbon dioxide from the atmosphere – and it is entirely different between extracting and preventing.”

According to the researcher’s calculations the costs of curbing co2 via the planting of trees would be in between 42 and 63 euros per tonne. This makes it competitive with other strategies, such as the more high tech carbon capture and storage, external (CCS).

A number of nations are currently trialling this innovation, external however it has yet to be released commercially.

Growing jatropha not just takes in 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 say the scientists, providing an economic return.

“Jatropha is perfect to be turned into biokerosene – it is even better than biodiesel,” stated Prof Becker.

But other specialists in this area are not encouraged. They point to the truth that in 2007 and 2008 great deals of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, particularly in Africa. But much of these endeavors ended in tears,, external as the plants were not very successful in handling dry conditions.

Lucy Hurn is the biofuels campaign supervisor for the charity, Actionaid. She says that while jatropha was when seen as the fantastic, green hope the truth was really various.

“When jatropha was presented it was seen as a wonder crop, it would grow on scrubland or marginal land,” she said.

“But there are typically people who require marginal land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that location – we would not class the land as marginal.”

She mentioned that jatropha is extremely harmful and can pollute the land it is grown on, even in a desert. And she also had issues about the fairness of the idea.

“It is still somebody else’s land. Why enter and grow these massive plantations to handle an issue these individuals didn’t in fact trigger?”

Follow Matt on Twitter, external.

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Related internet links

Universität Hohenheim

European Geosciences Union

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