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Researchers Find Rapid Way to Make Carbon Dioxide-Storing Mineral Magnesite
Sci-News.com ^ | Aug 16, 2018 | News Staff / Source

Posted on 08/19/2018 7:42:33 AM PDT by ETL

Scientists are already working to slow global warming by removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but there are serious practical and economic limits on developing the technology.

Now, for the first time, they have explained how magnesite forms at low temperature, and offered a route to dramatically accelerating its crystallization.

“Our work shows two things. Firstly, we have explained how and how fast magnesite forms naturally,” Professor Power said.

“This is a process which takes hundreds to thousands of years in nature at Earth’s surface.”

“The second thing we have done is to demonstrate a pathway which speeds this process up dramatically.”

Professor Power and colleagues were able to show that by using polystyrene microspheres as a catalyst, magnesite would form within 72 days.

The microspheres themselves are unchanged by the production process, so they can ideally be reused.

“Using microspheres means that we were able to speed up magnesite formation by orders of magnitude,” Professor Power said.

“This process takes place at room temperature, meaning that magnesite production is extremely energy efficient.”

“For now, we recognise that this is an experimental process, and will need to be scaled up before we can be sure that magnesite can be used in carbon sequestration (taking carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and permanently storing it as magnesite).”

“This depends on several variables, including the price of carbon and the refinement of the sequestration technology, but we now know that the science makes it do-able.”

The researchers presented their results this week at the Goldschmidt 2018 conference in Boston, Massachusetts.

(Excerpt) Read more at sci-news.com ...


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To: PeterPrinciple

CO2 level in a tightly built home is substantially higher than the atmosphere. A level twenty times current levels is the threshold for concern. Likely be overrun by foliage far before that point.


41 posted on 08/19/2018 10:09:47 AM PDT by Ozark Tom
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To: Ozark Tom

CO2 comprises something like a measly 0.04% of our atmosphere. And most of that, I believe, is of natural origin.


42 posted on 08/19/2018 10:42:12 AM PDT by ETL (Obama-Hillary, REAL Russia collusion! Uranium-One Deal, Missile Defense, Iran Deal, Nukes: Click ETL)
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To: ETL

Okay libs, decision time.

Do you want trees and plants or do you want to starve the vegetation by storing its food in a bunch of rocks.

You’re choice. Can’t have both.

Settled science :)


43 posted on 08/19/2018 10:52:26 AM PDT by upchuck (As we head to the midterms, please (re)read Confessions of Congressman X - tinyurl.com/congressmanx)
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To: Seaplaner

One suspects that one of the key reasons that atmospheric CO2 is so low (~400 ppm) is that our green photosynthetic friends have adapted as survival strategies to be aggressive CO2 vacuum cleaners, competing for the minor, but essential for photosynthesis atmospheric gas.


or that someone designed it that way...………………………………..


44 posted on 08/19/2018 11:24:17 AM PDT by PeterPrinciple (Thinking Caps are no longer being issued but there must be a warehouse full of them somewhere.)
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To: PeterPrinciple

Thinking skills are lacking. We all remember the basic science experiment of putting the mouse in the glass bottle with plants. The mouse died during the night, but not during the day. co2 had nothing to do with it, what was it?


For all those without thinking caps. Plants respire as well as photosynthesize. Plants competed with the mouse for the O2 at night, the mouse lost. lack of o2, not c02 level was the problem...………………………………...


45 posted on 08/19/2018 11:49:13 AM PDT by PeterPrinciple (Thinking Caps are no longer being issued but there must be a warehouse full of them somewhere.)
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To: GingisK

Uses of magnesite include: cheap jewelry, refractory material for steel production (blast furnaces, kilns, and incinerators), as a binder in flooring materials, synthetic rubber production, and fertilizers and other chemicals.

Funny that most of the uses of this material produce a lot of other byproducts...


46 posted on 08/19/2018 12:57:03 PM PDT by reed13k
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To: ETL

.
Magnesite is Magnesium oxide.

Where does CO2 come into this?

CO2 is the molecule of life.

The more CO2 we have, the more abundant life becomes.

This is what the freaks are fighting: LIFE!
.


47 posted on 08/19/2018 1:08:56 PM PDT by editor-surveyor (Freepers: Not as smart as I'd hoped they'd be)
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To: MichaelCorleone

#4 You are using facts.
Now stop that or you will be de-platformed and erased from the internet.


48 posted on 08/19/2018 4:34:17 PM PDT by minnesota_bound
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To: Williams

THIS AGAIN ???

Simple question : Does it use up a whol lot of energy (CO2 producing fossil fuel burning) to produce this scrubber mineral, *MORE* than the CO2 it is allegedly able to absorb/fix ???

Add all production activities and transport and measures to dispose of the mega-tons of waste that would be generated by using this material — and how Fast would easy supplies of the ore it is made from run out/become less efficient ... ????

Impractical is for leftists and libtards - NOT FOR SANE PEOPLE


49 posted on 08/19/2018 6:40:31 PM PDT by elbook
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