What qualifies as carbon sequestration?

Question

I've read that its been proposed that carbon dioxide be collected and stored underground to keep it from acting like a greenhouse gas in the atmosphere.

It seems like making tons of stuff from non-biodegradable plastics, (like we do now), would actually be equally effective for sequestrating carbon.

The only problem I can see with the plastics is that they are made out of organic compounds that we pump out of the ground, meaning that the process via which we produce the plastics does not reduce the net carbon in circulation on the surface, (ie the plastics are made with carbon that would have originally been buried and thus originally sequestered).

It seems like this point may be able to be remedied by finding ways to produce plastics using organic elements that come from the surface and don't have to be dug up. In other words, it seems like we would want to figure out how to make plastics from trees and plants.

Does anyone see a problem with this line of reasoning?

Answer 1

WOW, what a good idea! If we could make plastic from bio diesel or whatever, that would definitely work. It would take CO2 out of the air and store it away safely for a long time!

You have saved the world!

Answer 2

Biofuels have a carbon footprint 85% -145% the size of oil based fuels, how much of this is in the burning I'm not sure. There are large amounts of energy in the chemicals used to grow the crops on degraded soil, transportation and processing. I should think the best waw of locking up carbon using land would be an increase in the use of timber in the construction industry where appropriate, i.e. not CA.

Don't forget the first of the 3 Rs

Answer 3

I understand people are buying blocks of dry ice and burring these blocks of frozen carbon dioxide in the ground.

They think this is going to help because they believe they are sequestering carbon.