Lake Nyos was a lake turning over but that does not diminish, by any means the danger and the possibility of a massive release of CO2 from such sites.

To quote an impeccable source, “The flow of CO2 into the ground from 800 GB of coal plants would equal the current flow of oil out of the ground. If we are going to store that huge amount of CO2 inside deep underground aquifers, exhaustive testing will have to be done. Each potential site will need intensive monitoring to guarantee it can store CO2 with no leaks. Very sensitive and low-cost in situ monitoring techniques must be developed to provide confidence that leakage rates are exceedingly low. The geologic stability of storage sites –think earthquakes–is especially important because a massive release of carbon dioxide could suffocate a huge number of people if it hit a populated area.”

Hell and Highwater, Joseph Romm pgs 158 -159

I guess I’ll have to break down and read the GAO report.

The IPCC technical report seems relatively upbeat about deep injection:

http://arch.rivm.nl/ env/ int/ ipcc/ pages_media/ SRCCS-final/ SRCCS_Chapter5.pdf

Underground accumulation of carbon dioxide (CO2) is a widespread geological phenomenon, with natural trapping of CO2 in underground reservoirs. Information and experience gained from the injection and/or storage of CO2 from a large number of existing enhanced oil recovery (EOR) and acid gas projects, as well as from the Sleipner, Weyburn and In Salah projects, indicate that it is feasible to store CO2 in geological formations as a CO2 mitigation option. Industrial analogues, including underground natural gas storage projects around the world and acid gas injection projects, provide additional indications that CO2 can be safely injected and stored at well-characterized and properly managed sites.

By the way, I’m not sure that any agency, including the GAO, is above political influence in this era of massive oil corporation influence and profits. I think I trust the IPCC more.

Some isotope data seems to show some CO2 sequestered for upwards of 50 million years, I seem to recall.

I have to agree, though, conversion to a carbonate seems like the best option, except for cost.

I’ve had some thoughts about talc, which is soft and easy to mine, as opposed to olivine, which is a hard rock. Unfortunately, the sheet silicates like talc are much less soluble than the chain silicates, I’ve read, and need to be heat treated to allow economic extraction of their calcium and magnesium.

It would be good to avoid the deep injection option if possible, but what are the relative risks when comparing deep injection with a methane catastrophe?

April 10th, 2009 at 3:19 pm

[CCS by deep injection worries me (the Devil is in the details), either, but I think we have to do this, temporarily, to prevent a methane catastrophe.]

Leland,

You’re right to be concerned about leaking CO2 from the salty aquifer depths. Although the scenario would not be identical a sudden release of CO2 to the surface from below could be deadly to any community near teh CO2 gas cloud An extreme example of the danger was demonstrated with the Lake Nyos disaster of August 21, 1986.

http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/ Lake_Nyos_disaster#The_1986_disaster

But, nothing I know of can have the decisive, synergistic impact of seizing the coal plants, and converting them to biocarbon/CCS carbon negative power plants. CCS by deep injection worries me (the Devil is in the details), either, but I think we have to do this, temporarily, to prevent a methane catastrophe.

http://www.killerinourmidst.com

Carbon sequestration by conversion of calcium and magnesium containing rocks to carbonates is nature’s way of sequestering CO2 and we should do everything we can to speed up this process, so we can do this ourselves.

A variation on Terra Preta would be to develop a concrete aggregate containing a high fraction of biochar, while still retaining desirable structural properties and fire resistance. This could perhaps be accomplished by mixing it with geopolymer or by mixing it with clay and then firing it using more biochar or pyrolysis gas, as is done in producing carbon electrodes and hard grades of pencil lead.

Joe,

OK, I’ll watch, but that doesn’t mean I will be complacent with respect to Cap and trade. Since that’s the way it’s going I would like it to go full tilt toward all permits to be auctioned off.

http://www.etsap.org/worksh_6_2003/2003P_read.pdf

Putting the genie back in the bottle and allowing nature to heal itself is the way to go, IMO, along with renewable energies and stabilization wedges.

I don’t think we are smart enough to manage the earth’s climate by most of the other geoengineering approaches.

We need to put the situation back to what it was a centuries ago, and allow the earth system to manage its own climate, as it has been able to do with near 100% success for over a billion years.

Unintended consequences are to be expected, as are the unexpected, lets hope there are no unimagined consequences.

[JR: Not! If you think Holdren works that way, you don't know him. The reporter got the story wrong. what else is there to say?]