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Desert ‘carbon Farming’ To Curb CO2

Desert ‘carbon farming’ to suppress CO2

1 August 2013

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By Matt McGrath

Environment correspondent, BBC News

Scientists state that planting great deals of jatropha trees in desert areas might be an effective way of curbing emissions of CO2.

Dubbed “carbon farming”, state the concept is financially competitive with state-of-the-art carbon capture and storage projects.

But critics state the idea might be have unexpected, negative impacts including driving up food prices.

The research has actually been released, external in the journal Earth System Dynamics.

Seeds of modification

Jatropha curcas is a plant that came from in Central America and is effectively adjusted to harsh conditions including exceptionally dry deserts.

It is already grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world because its seeds can produce oil.

In this study, German scientists revealed that one hectare of jatropha might capture approximately 25 tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere every year. The scientists based their estimates on trees presently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.

“The results are overwhelming,” stated Prof Klaus Becker, from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.

“There was excellent growth, a great reaction from these plants. I feel there will be no issue attempting it on a much larger scale, for example 10 thousand hectares in the start,” he said.

According to the scientists a plantation that would cover 3 percent of the Arabian desert would absorb all the CO2 produced by cars and trucks in Germany over a twenty years period.

The scientists say that an important aspect of the strategy would be the accessibility of desalination facilities. This suggests that initially, any plantations would be confined to coastal locations.

They are hoping to develop bigger trials in desert areas of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker states that unlike other schemes that simply offset the carbon that people produce, the planting of jatropha could be a good, short term service to climate change.

“I believe it is an excellent concept since we are really drawing out co2 from the atmosphere – and it is totally different between drawing out and preventing.”

According to the researcher’s estimations the expenses of curbing co2 via the planting of trees would be in between 42 and 63 euros per tonne. This makes it competitive with other techniques, such as the more high tech carbon capture and storage, external (CCS).

A variety of countries are currently trialling this technology, external however it has yet to be deployed commercially.

Growing jatropha not only takes in CO2 however has other benefits. The plants would help to make desert areas more habitable, and the plant’s seeds can be collected for biofuel state the scientists, supplying an economic return.

“Jatropha is ideal to be developed into biokerosene – it is even much better than biodiesel,” said Prof Becker.

But other experts in this location are not persuaded. They point to the reality that in 2007 and 2008 big numbers of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, particularly in Africa. But a lot of these endeavors ended in tears,, external as the plants were not very successful in managing dry conditions.

Lucy Hurn is the biofuels campaign manager for the charity, Actionaid. She says that while jatropha was once seen as the terrific, green hope the truth was really different.

“When jatropha was introduced it was viewed as a miracle crop, it would grow on scrubland or limited land,” she said.

“But there are typically individuals who require marginal land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that location – we wouldn’t class the land as limited.”

She pointed out that jatropha is highly harmful and can pollute the land it is grown on, even in a desert. And she also had issues about the fairness of the concept.

“It is still someone else’s land. Why enter and grow these massive plantations to handle an issue these people didn’t in fact trigger?”

Follow Matt on Twitter, external.

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Related internet links

Universität Hohenheim

European Geosciences Union

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