If Chemical 'sponge' could filter CO2 from the air, would we need to stop using coal and oil?

Article at


http://environment.newscientist.com/arti鈥?/a>





Pretend that sponge is so cheap it is like free, so it is easy to absorb CO2 to get any ppm we want, even less than 100 years ago. Should carbon emissions still be restricted? Why/why not?If Chemical 'sponge' could filter CO2 from the air, would we need to stop using coal and oil?
Yes, for several reasons.





1) CO2 is not the only biproduct of burning fossil fuels. As mucky suggested, just take a look at China's air (seriously, you can see it!).





2) Fossil fuels are nonrenewable resources - there's a limit to how much coal and oil we can realistically extract from the Earth. Before long we'll start to run out and prices will skyrocket. The sooner we prepare for Peak Oil, the better off we'll be when it hits.





3) Oil is also located primarily in unstable political regions like the Middle East. We'd be better off reducing our dependency on foreign oil.





4) Encouraging new green technologies will benefit our economy because we'll get investment in new companies and products. Just think back to how well our economy was doing during the dot com boom.





5) There are only so many places we can store carbon underground. You need the appropriate geological conditions for the CO2 to remain sequestered indefinitely. In other words, even if the sponge were to work, it would not solve our global warming problem entirely.If Chemical 'sponge' could filter CO2 from the air, would we need to stop using coal and oil?
You mean something like a big alkaline ocean of water? That would be totally wicked. If the planet had something like that we wouldn't need to control our CO2 emissions at all. The big alkaline ocean of water would simply absorb all the CO2 from the atmosphere and everything would be most excellent.
Why don't we gat bored of 'magic bullets'? Things like this only waste time because we think technology is going to come to the rescue so we can continue to sit on our butts.





Ask someone dying from the pollution in China this question, or the communities split by a highway, or the commuters stuck in thier cars for hours, I could go on.
No need to build a sponge.


The sponge is already present and working well. It is called the OCEANS. The oceans absorb every bit of CO2 that it contacts. lt is a limitless sink for CO2. Always has been, always will be. That is the way nature devised it. The oceans are working 24/7 to accomplish it.


Well, land plants do absorb some CO2. Approximately 3% of the time.


It is also true that wood for building houses takes a large percentage of CO2 out of circulation for many years. Stores it and allows room for more trees to grow and take up CO2.


Why limit coal and oil burning? It can not increase the atmospheric CO2 because of the above reasons.


The only fuel that CAN have an effect on atmospheric CO2 is the jet engines burning thousands of tons of fuel daily above 30,000 ft. Nature does not have an efficient method of clearing CO2 from that high of an elevation.
eventually you would have to dispose of the filter which would fill up the land fill.