Since the Industrial Revolution humans have emitted more than 2,000 Giga tons
of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that's the weight of more than 400
billion African elephants five and a half million Empire State building's or
three hundred forty-seven thousand great pyramids this thickening blanket of
heat-trapping greenhouse gases has a tremendous effect on the climate and the
world we live in if you guys want in a future video we
can explore how we're trying to reduce our emissions or the effects those
emissions have on our planet but today we're gonna be talking about six ways
that we're trying to actively remove co2 from the air so let's jump in
while the expansion of renewable energies and more efficient energy
systems is expected to cut global emissions by more than half by 2100 most
estimates show we'll need to remove billions of metric tons of carbon
dioxide annually by mid-century to keep the climate in check carbon removal can
come in many different forms some simple some technologically advanced so today
we're gonna look at six of the biggest ways scientists are trying to pull
greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere first forests this one's a simple one
trees are probably the most common carbon sink that people are aware of by
the way a carbon sink is just something that removes co2 from the air force
absorb about fifteen percent of the carbon dioxide generated by burning
fossil fuels every year that's more than fifteen hundred million metric tons of
emissions every year photosynthesis removes carbon dioxide naturally and
owns trees absorbent they're especially good at storing it expanding restoring
and managing existing force more effectively or ways scientists are
training leverage the power of photosynthesis to convert carbon dioxide
in the air into carbon stored in the wood and soil every acre of land or
storage a temperate force can sequester about three metric tons of co2 per year
these approaches can be relatively inexpensive and yield cleaner air and
water all providing a place for you to walk your dog one of the major
challenges to plant trees on a mass scale is to ensure that forest expansion
in one area doesn't come at the expense of force somewhere else for example
where for farmland could reduce the food supply
which could necessitate converting forests somewhere else
especially in other countries to farmland these dynamics make restoring
and managing new and existing forest especially challenging since I mentioned
trees I'd be remiss not to mention that Mister beasts and mark robbers
fundraiser to plant 20 million trees is still ongoing
they've already planted more than 14 million trees and if you're interested
in supporting go to team trees org link in the description the second way to
pull emissions involves farms soils naturally store carbon like a lot of it
surprisingly the Earth's soil contains four times more carbon than the total
stored in all living plants and animals including those forests we just talked
about there are more than 250 million acres of farmland in the u.s. that's the
size of Texas and California combined but agricultural soils are running a big
carbon deficit due to their intensive use because of how much farmland there
is even small improvements in farming practices that increase the carbon per
acre on farms are hugely impactful building soil carbon is even good for
farmers and ranchers since it increases soil health and crop yields planning
cover crops those are the crops that cover the ground when fields would
otherwise be bare during off seasons or off years can extend photosynthesis
throughout the year and using compost can improve yields while store
accomplished carbon content in the soil scientists are even working to breed
crops with deeper roots making them more resistant to drought while depositing
more carbon into the soil number three bioenergy with carbon
capture and storage otherwise known as Becks Beck's
is another way choose photosynthesis to combat climate change but it's far more
complicated than planting trees or managing soils and it doesn't always
work for the climate if it's not done right Beks is the process of extracting
bio energy from biomass and capturing and storing the carbon thus removing it
from the atmosphere it's a hard definition to understand so let's work
with the most common example energy plants will grow trees or crops as the
plants grow they'll pull co2 out of the air
then once the plant is grown carbon is left behind while biomass is extracted
for biofuel production biofuel can be used to power cars or
planes and the carbon that was left behind can be stored underground or
mixed into long-lived products like concrete
so fuel was produced or removing co2 from the air as of 2019 five facilities
around the world who are actively using Beck's technologies and are capturing
approximately 1.5 million tons of co2 per year while this technology is
clearly prohibitively expensive research has shown that similar methods could
increase both energy generation and co2 removal by more than 50 times relative
to modern-day Beck systems so the technology does show promise number for
direct air capture this is probably what most people think of when talking about
removing co2 from the air direct air capture is the process of chemically
scrubbing carbon dioxide directly from the ambient air and again storing it
either underground or long live products like concrete this new technology is not
unlike the carbon capture and storage technology employed today at power
plants and industrial facilities it's relatively straightforward to measure
and account for the climate benefits of direct air capture and its potential
scale is enormous but the technology remains costly and energy intensive but
as the energy and Technology costs go down and more energy is produced by
renewable sources direct air capture has the potential to take back billions of
tons of emissions annually number five sea water capture direct air capture
look for the fish's oceans are actually the largest carbon sink on earth while
the oceans represent a great potential to reduce emissions when they absorb co2
it increases the acidity of the sea water and increasing the acidity of the
oceans has its own effects like destroying coral reefs and delicate
ecosystems but scientists are looking in a ways to scrub co2 out of the oceans
like rescrub co2 out of the air by reducing co2 concentration in the ocean
the water then draws in more carbon from the air to regain balance and seawater
has a much higher density of co2 compared to ambient air which means less
work is required to separate it out than indirect air capture but sea water is
also considerably heavier than air which means more work to move it through any
processing facility the US Navy already developed a prototype seawater
capture device because co2 can be converted to fuel by adding energy this
technology can allow vessels to create their own fuel at sea of course if the
captured carbon is converted to fuel and combusted it just returns to the
atmosphere but this still reduces the need to add new emissions by burning
fossil fuels and future applications of this technology could Fred long term
storage for captured carbon last but not least enhanced weathering some minerals
naturally react with co2 turning carbon from a gas into a solid this process is
commonly referred to as weathering and it typically happens very slowly but
scientists are figuring out how to speed up the process this could mean pumping
mineral water not the kind you buy in stores from underground deposits to the
surface where minerals can react with the air another example would be moving
air through large deposits of mine tailings the parts that mines ago that
don't have the ores they're looking for that contain the right mineral
composition to absorb co2 all these technologies have to grapple with how
cost effective and easy to scale they are the final answer probably won't be
just one of them but a combination of them working together I hope you enjoyed
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