• Gaurav Sant is flipping a switch on a machine aboard a barge in Los Angeles that will suck water from the Pacific Ocean and reduce its carbon dioxide levels.
• The machine is part of a larger effort to geoengineer the ocean to absorb more carbon dioxide.
• The ocean is already absorbing 90% of excess heat generated by burning fossil fuels and holds an estimated 41,000 gigatons of carbon.
• Strategies to increase ocean alkalinity, such as adding antacids to the ocean, are being explored to increase the ocean’s capacity to absorb carbon dioxide.
• Douglas Wallace, a chemical oceanographer at Canada’s Dalhousie University, believes this approach could make a difference without causing massive ecosystem risks.
• However, there are still many unknowns about the effectiveness and economic viability of these strategies, as well as potential ecological effects.
• Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan recently put $21 million into the UCLA Institute for Carbon Management, where Sant’s project began.
Published February 8, 2023
Visit Nautilus to read Warren Cornwall’s original post How Seawater Might Soak Up More Carbon
