Why can’t we just sequester CO2 into plants we eat or forests?

1.30K viewsBiologyOther

I saw a youtube video about how Japan burns materials that can’t easily be recycled to produce energy and captures the CO2 produced from the process. The CO2 is then sold to some local factories to produce various things like fire extinguishers, and some algae farms (I googled this and algae is used to produce food and oil).

I googled that at sea level, CO2 in the atmosphere is at 350 PPM, but certain plants thrive at 1500 PPM.

It got me thinking – why can’t we pump CO2 into indoor farms, plantations or forests to sequester more carbon?

Would that even work? Is the carbon just released into the air again once the plants are eaten or broken down?

In: Biology

23 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Yes! You can grow plants. They’d have to be new plants that weren’t there before,

There is also “carbon capture” technology where carbon from the atmosphere is collected and stored (carbon sequestration).

People are researching these things.

For this to be effective, it would have to completely offset all the carbon which is put into the air each year.

At the moment, they aren’t anywhere near the scale which is needed. It’s like trying to empty a lake with a coffee mug while a river is also flowing into it. But maybe there will be a breakthrough someday.

You are viewing 1 out of 23 answers, click here to view all answers.