Desert 'carbon farming' to suppress CO2
1 August 2013
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By Matt McGrath
Environment reporter, BBC News
Scientists say that planting great deals of jatropha trees in desert areas might be a reliable way of curbing emissions of CO2.
Dubbed "carbon farming", researchers say the concept is financially competitive with modern carbon capture and storage tasks.
But critics state the concept might be have unexpected, negative impacts including increasing food rates.
The research study has been published, external in the System Dynamics.
Seeds of change
Jatropha curcas is a plant that originated in Central America and is effectively adjusted to severe conditions including extremely arid deserts.
It is already grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world due to the fact that its seeds can produce oil.
In this study, German researchers revealed that one hectare of jatropha might catch up to 25 tonnes of co2 from the environment every year. The scientists based their quotes on trees presently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.
"The outcomes are frustrating," said Prof Klaus Becker, from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.
"There was good development, an excellent reaction from these plants. I feel there will be no issue trying it on a much larger scale, for example 10 thousand hectares in the beginning," he stated.
According to the scientists a plantation that would cover 3 percent of the Arabian desert would take in all the CO2 produced by automobiles and trucks in Germany over a 20 year period.
The researchers say that an important component of the strategy would be the availability of desalination facilities. This implies that initially, any plantations would be restricted to seaside locations.
They are wishing to develop bigger trials in desert areas of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker says that unlike other schemes that simply balance out the carbon that people produce, the planting of jatropha might be a great, short-term option to environment modification.
"I think it is an excellent idea due to the fact that we are really extracting co2 from the atmosphere - and it is entirely different between extracting and avoiding."
According to the scientist's computations the costs of curbing co2 by means of the planting of trees would be in between 42 and 63 euros per tonne. This makes it competitive with other strategies, such as the more high tech carbon capture and storage, external (CCS).
A number of countries are presently trialling this innovation, external but it has yet to be released commercially.
Growing jatropha not only soaks up CO2 however has other advantages. The plants would help to make desert areas more habitable, and the plant's seeds can be gathered for biofuel say the scientists, supplying an economic return.
"Jatropha is perfect to be turned into biokerosene - it is even better than biodiesel," stated Prof Becker.
But other specialists in this location are not convinced. They indicate the truth that in 2007 and 2008 large numbers of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, particularly in Africa. But a number of these endeavors ended in tears,, external as the plants were not extremely successful in dealing with dry conditions.
Lucy Hurn is the biofuels campaign supervisor for the charity, Actionaid. She states that while jatropha was when seen as the great, green hope the truth was extremely different.
"When jatropha was presented it was viewed as a wonder crop, it would grow on scrubland or minimal land," she said.
"But there are typically people who need minimal land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that area - we would not class the land as limited."
She mentioned that jatropha is highly harmful and can contaminate the land it is grown on, even in a desert. And she also had concerns about the fairness of the idea.
"It is still somebody else's land. Why go in and grow these massive plantations to handle a problem these individuals didn't actually cause?"
Follow Matt on Twitter, external.
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Related internet links
Universität Hohenheim
European Geosciences Union
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Desert 'carbon Farming' To Curb CO2
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