Author Archives: Adam Clare

We Can Use Container Ships to Sequester CO2

wind enhanced ship

Years of researchers looking into carbon sequestration have concluded two things:
1. It’s far better to reduce emissions than rely on sequestration to avoid climate catastrophe
2. Ocean-based sequestration is more efficient than direct air capture.

A team of researchers have found a way to get container ships to help with sequestration of carbon into the ocean by using an accelerated natural process. It’s well known that modern fossil-fuel powered shipping is very bad for the planet so the researchers wondered what if we could leverage the movement of ships on the water to spread limestone over greater distances? They modelled it out and this approach of using ships as a way to spread the carbon sequestration method is quite efficient and better than a stationary setup.

Calcium carbonate dissolution is the dominant negative feedback in the ocean for neutralizing the acidity from rising atmospheric carbon dioxide. Mimicking this natural process, the accelerated weathering of limestone (AWL) can store carbon as bicarbonate in the ocean for tens of thousands of years. Here, we evaluate the potential of AWL on ships as a carbon sequestration approach. We show a successful prediction of laboratory measurements using a model that includes the most recent calcite dissolution kinetics in seawater. When simulated along a Pacific shipping lane in the Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean–Darwin ocean–general circulation model, surface alkalinity and dissolved inorganic carbon increase by <1.4% after 10 years of continuous operation, leaving a small pH and partial pressure of carbon dioxide impact to the ocean while reducing 50% carbon dioxide emission in maritime transportation.

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China Leads Renewable Investments

A graph showing increasing investment in renewables with China outpacing other countries.

The country has nearly tripled spending on renewables since 2015

China is clearly winning the global race to renewable energy, with a near trebling of investment into the sector over the last decade. China’s manufacturing industry is primed to produce solar panels, wind turbines, heat pumps, and so on for the rest of the world. There’s a lot of profit to be made as the globe gets fully electrified and moves away from fossil fuels. The Republicans in the USA have guaranteed victory to China in their recent budget. Of course, other nations can all vie for second and ought to as the future is green power and whichever nation can produce renewable energy in the most economical way will dominate the later half of the century.

China is on an absolute tear installing wind and solar power. The country reached nearly 900 gigawatts of installed capacity for solar at the end of 2024, and the rapid pace of building has continued into this year. An additional 198 GW was installed between January and May, with 93 GW coming in May alone.

For context, those additions over the first five months of the year account for more than double the capacity of the grid in California. Not the renewables capacity of that state—the entire grid.

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How Microgrids in Puerto Rico Help During Hurricanes

A picture of a microgrid setup in Puerto Rico

Back in 2017 Puerto Rico was hit hard by Hurricane Maria and lost power for an extended period of time and led to nearly 3,000 lives lost due to the loss of power. Puerto Ricans decided that they would never let that happen again, so they started a massive roll out of renewable energy. The island now has a series of microgrids that won’t lose power when the main grid goes down. Renewable energy means a sustainable planet and a sustainable connection to energy.

At the end of March, LUMA reported over 1.14 gigawatts of grid-connected distributed solar capacity, with an additional 2.34 gigawatt-hours of distributed batteries connected to the grid. Solar power produces over 2 terawatt-hours of electricity each year, which accounts for more than 12.5 percent of Puerto Rico’s total residential electricity consumption annually. The majority of that power is generated from residential solar, and capacity continues to grow as more residents install systems with private financing.

Adjuntas, which has a population of about 18,000, took a more experimental approach. The town’s local environmental nonprofit Casa Pueblo teamed up with researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tenn., to develop a way to connect multiple microgrids to exchange power with one another, all without having to be hooked up to Puerto Rico’s grid. The strategy, called grid orchestration, ensures that if power is knocked out on one of the installations, the others aren’t compromised. It’s what kept multiple areas in Adjuntas electrified during April’s island-wide blackout.

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Fig Trees Figured Out Carbon Storage

The humble fig tree can help us in extracting carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by converting it in into stone. All trees remove CO2 from the air and store it in their wood, however as the wood biodegrades the CO2 is released again. Fig trees, on the other hand, combine the CO2 within itself to form stone!

“What was really a surprise, and I’m still kind of reeling from, is that the [calcium carbonate] had really gone far deeper into the wood structures than I expected,” says Rowley, who will present the work at the Goldschmidt Conference in Prague, the Czech Republic, this week. “I expected it to be a superficial process in the cracks and weaknesses within the wood structure.”

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How Canada Can Have Affordable Housing

ai image of a banker building a house

Ever since the federal government stopped building housing in the 90s and let the housing market function without intervention the cost of housing in the country has skyrocketed. The lack of action and leadership at both the federal and the provincial levels has led to our current housing crisis. An organization, More and Better Housing, has plotted out Canada can easily solve our housing issues.

Four Pathways to Housing Affordability

  1. Making home ownership and rent more affordable by cutting building costs.
  2. Keeping property taxes and transportation costs in check by allowing more building in convenient locations.
  3. Lowering insurance and maintenance costs by building sturdier homes in safer areas.
  4. Reducing utility bills with energy-efficient homes.

The new report analyzes specific recommendations from the Blueprint, finding that they give governments the tools to drive down five key shelter costs, which make up over 40% of middle-class household budgets.

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