Natural Experiments Prove Phytoplankton Carbon Removal Works
I explore how natural events like Saharan dust storms, volcanic eruptions, and wildfires have long fertilized oceans, triggering massive phytoplankton blooms that remove carbon dioxide. Decades of satellite data and research cruises confirm that adding iron to nutrient-poor waters reliably boosts marine life and sequesters carbon, debunking fears that such geoengineering is untested or risky.
Never in a million years would the craziest of the mad geoengineers dream of adding a fraction of the iron the Sahara dumps on the North Atlantic every day.
- program_whiz
This article shows that we can reliably cause phytoplankton blooms, but doesn't link it with actual "carbon removal". I suppose CO2 is temporarily removed in the form of the bloom, but I believe historically these blooms have a low efficiency for "permanent capture" because the plankton decay or are consumed. The only way to effectively capture would be to somehow create the bloom, then sink the phytoplankton en masse deep within the ocean where the would be neither eaten or decayed. Maybe possible with the right setup, but hard to scale.
- phtrivier
Don't know if it's off topic, ad hominem, or whatnot : but this substack is an almost comical example of a "one-post-poney".
The author is VERY much a fan of phytoplankton fertilization. He does not cite many other people talking about it, but he is very very very convinced.
Maybe he's right, but the tone and the "once you have a hammer, everything look like deep ocean fertilization" bit does not help.
- arijun
> [People think we] couldn’t possibly know what the consequences would be.
> It’s not true, though. We have quite a precise understanding of what happens
Ah, man, the hubris to see a long history of human interventions with unexpected knock on consequences, and think, “but this time we know.” It’s comical, even. We’re talking about an intervention large enough to reverse decades of climate change, of course there will be unintended consequences.
In the end, however, we will likely have to do something, and this might be the solution with the best-mapped consequences (and thus fewest unforeseen consequences).