List as many ways in what ways that may remove CO₂ completely in the 21st Century. Be original instead of electric hybrid cars, less driving cars, and closing down greenhouses and smoke factories.

I don't think growing a large amount of trees everywhere will absorb all CO₂ in our atmosphere and releasing out O₂ is the best idea even if I made up an idea about it.

With the nanotech in research in Universities, what if we use nano technology, as light as CO₂ should be able to remove CO₂. Through heavy amount of programing, scientists may allow the nano sized-particles return to the Facility for cleaning. Though these nano particles are only limited to at least twenty feet away from the ground surface if it may harm anybody breathing out CO₂. Even though it's global, I only think that the nano particles will remove enough CO₂ through a single city.

Another idea, though may sound bizarre, there are plants and trees on top of Skyscrapers, buildings, side view of Highways and Freeways. Those possibilities may absorb enough CO₂ at out of reach areas from the actual natural trees. Planting trees on top of every skyscraper absorbing CO₂ and releasing O₂. Only idiots will cut the trees from that high. It doesn't have to be greenhouses, it could be 15 ft deep amount of soil.

What are your ideas? Or criticisms? I'm positive that both of my ideas are not the best answers.

Yea lets fight the symptom instead of the disease.

Oh, yeah, nuking everything of coure would stop CO₂...

Plants may be a helping force against CO₂, but they also start releasing everything they've built up when they die. That's why logging areas tend to have a large amount of CO2 release.

There are plenty of technologies that can help reduce CO2, but for political, cultural, and financial reasons, implementing them may be difficult. So in order to make some actual changes, technology definitely helps, but human habits need to change. That may sound cliche, but doesn't it seem like people are less willing to change than they are able to? I suppose there is a natural fear of change for we would have to adapt. Adaptation is usually forced upon a living-thing when its surroundings change. When surroundings change around a living-thing, the thing does not know whether it can ultimately survive or not, but still adapts to what it can in hopes of doing so. However, that trend tends to be for ANIMALS. As Humans, we are able and are making our own surroundings. We can make things to our comfort given the blockade set upon ourselves allows us to (cultural, political, financial, etc.), meaning we can change even without the incentive of surviving. But the changes we make tend to benefit ourselves and make the rest of the surroundings either no better off or even worse.

Therefore, I THINK, we need to educate. Educate not as in just send more people to school. Teaching positions needs to be more prestigious pay-wise. Teachers for most of the world if not all, are greatly underpaid and seems to be that people who are still teaching below college level are those who either would rather not look for another career, or those who simply love the fact that they're making changes to the world by educating students. Of course, a bigger paycheck would also require a more strict qualification. A more strict system towards employment of teachers would give a small-scale survival of the fittest. Those who aspire to be teachers, along from their own inspirations, would also have a decent pay as an incentive. Since some countries pay teachers through the government, such as the United States, then there needs to be such a change in the political sense.

Education is important because we need to understand that WE, as HUMANS, are causing the reasons we need to adapt. However, one may argue that we caused what we have in order to survive... better! But may we remind ourselves we don't exactly need automatic dishwashers in homes. We also do not need a car for each of the 16, 17, and 18 year old or run the computer while we watch TV and play handhelds. Of course, we want our lives to be as comfortable and entertaining as possible, but with education, and appreciation of nature we may be able to gain the same if not greater satisfaction without abusing the priviligious(sp) of technology. This change would be toward the cutural sense.

Of course, money is always an issue. But need it be such a large issue? Need we pay our sportsplayers more than the amount squared of our, say, recycle sorting worker? The sportsplayer is great at what he does because he or she tends to spend hours perfecting a skill. Does a recycle worker not sort trash on 12 hour shifts daily? There is much to go on finance, but I haven't the time...

My friends and I do not throw our trash in certain facilities on the ground even though we know it's someone else's job to pick it up. Trash is not defined as nuclear waste. The small strip of paper from a straw you've rolled up and released to drop is also trash. Why don't we? Not because we feel like heroes. But why not make someone's job easier? Look around you when you go out. How many people do you see making others' jobs easier? Does the obese woman pick up the hanging toys that fell when she brushed against it? Do the teenagers at McDonald's throw the trash on their trays away and return the trays to their designated areas?

So, would you like to make someone's job easier? How about mother nature? How? There are so many ways an individual can help, the hardest thing is not finding the time or money, but how one wants to help. Recycling (or better yet, reuse), taking public transportation, biking, conservation in energy in general--the methods one can help only stops when one stops counting. Remember, however, that just because you conserved in one area does not at all mean you should waste energy elsewhere. Doesn't this sound like saving money? Save where you can, spend where you have to. Do a global favor, save for the planet.

To talk about a technology, though, I especially like one. I forgot what it's called, but it's nano technology, upon pressure, it generates a small electrical charge. A simple breeze in the wind is enough to generate power for your ipod. While I do not know much else about this technology, such as costs, material, maintenance, developement, etc., but I do know that many countries are looking for ways to implement that into their everyday life. For instance, France has considered to cover some of their buildings with said technology, allowing natural occurrences such as rain and wind to help generate power.

When it becomes financially profitable to cut pollution, you can bet on seeing it happen. Right now, it costs a great deal of fossil fuels to support so called "non fossil fuels". I have to wonder just how much oil and coal is burned by building the machines that make nano-machines, training and driving the scientists, harvesting and transporting the raw building materials, the electricity to power the facility, etc... How much fossil fuel does it take to produce an environmentally conscious human?

Yes, my answer is apathetic, but the way I see it: If we screw up the earth so badly that we end up killing ourselves, then we deserve it. Maybe it's not so bad if that's how it ends up.

Nope.
CANDYLAND
Take tha science claz again kthxbai.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on May 12 2008, 3:44 pm by FlyingHat.

Being passive until all the mankind dies. Afterwards life will start a new cycle and hopefully no other intelligent creature will evolve again

There are two main different approaches to this problem: reducing the CO2 creation rate OR increasing the CO2 -> O2 conversion rate.

Reducing the CO2 creation rate wouldn't be really simple. As an evolving civilization we'll keep developing further technology and this we will need more and more energy. So we need alternative ways of extracting it. Switching off a lightbulb for an hour or leaving the car parked one day won't help, since sooner or later we'll need not only that energy but a whole lot more.

Moving on from the fossil fuels to other energy sources is a big steep, but has a big drawback: you don't get as much energy from most of them. Nuclear energy is a good alternative, even while it being more dangerous, if treated correctly it can a good solution.

In the second group of solutions is what this topic was originally for, even when it has gone kinda offtopic.


Trees are helpful. But an high concentration of them is needed to archieve a noticeable effect. Plating two or three trees here and there won't help. Ironically, rainforest are getting destroyed at an high rate to plant corn, which is then fermented to obtain etanol used to create the biofuels. Capitalism eventually leads to this kind of things...

Unicellular algaes are actually way more efficient at removing CO2 than trees are. We might see in the near future air recycling plants which use algaes to transform CO2 into O2 using solar energy.


Of course nanotech could be used to get rid of the CO2 excess. In fact, proteins are the most beautiful and welldone nanotech machines ever created. Using those proteins you could build an artificial chroloplast-like plant which not only would remove CO2 using sunlight, but also it'd create sugar that could be later sold.
The biggest problem of proteins (specially the ones that dealt with sunlight) is that sunbeams often damage them irreversively and they have to be replaced. And without a cellular mechanism of protein repairment and replacement the plant would be destroyed in a matter of hours or days.

So looks like you either have the whole cell working for the plant, or a good protein replacement mechanism would have to be created in order to get this idea to work.


Planting some trees over skycrappers, as I've already addressed before, won't have a noticeable effect. You need hundreds and hundreds of very BIG trees to archieve something. This idea is totally useless...

Of course, eliminating the existence of Humans is a way to cut the planet some slack. To say that we simply should wipe the Human race off the face of the planet, however, is unfair. To whom? Everyone else, especially yourself. And yes, if we screw up the Earth so badly and end up killing ourselves, we deserve it. But the question is not whether we deserve it or not, it's WHAT we deserve. Think about what YOU deserve...

Removing the Human race from what mankind made is as bad as littering... you create a bunch of trash, and dump it out your window. Eventually, Nature will overgrow and reclaim its ancient properties. Should we simply run away from what we've caused? One could easily say yes, but what could that one say about life itself, then? Leave it to worsen until eventually we will die and Time will continue on with but a physical dent and a mental memory.

As for technology and education, think of it this way:
1) Research and educating may be costly financially and provide a degree of pollution, but recall to yourselves the technological advances we have made in the last decade alone. Now, since Humans are not likely to change their habitual behaviors, such as contacting one another hundreds of miles apart, the way of doing so has changed. Now we mail messages electronically, making it more efficient. "But the energy and resources required are much greater than a man and his horse!" one might argue. Note that "more efficient" does not equate to "less costly." What has happened is that those of us who are fortunate to have greater technologies often take it for granted and abuse the priviliouge (wow, sp on that one please).

2) Technically, all the sources of energy on the planet comes from the Sun. Argue as you may, but all answers lead to the Sun and roads did to Rome. "What about Thermal and Tidal energy?" Truth be told, I've forgotten the arguments there, but they're there. There are many ways to harness energy, the question being which way is better. But "better" is often simply an opinion, and all sources of energy must have some sort of negative outputs, right? Perhaps, and maybe that there is an answer in the question. Perhaps it's best that we use many sources of energy, fanning out the amount of pollution to the different outputs instead of massively overloading one output, such as CO2. Education would allow more research which may eventually lead to a greater variety of energy.
Think about this: With good maintenance, how long can a solar-powered calculator run? What's the cost of maintenance? Let's assume it costs 20 units of pollution to create the little solar panel in a calculator and can yield 400 units of energy a year. Let's also assume that batteries cost 20 units of pollution, but yields 1800 units of energy a year. Now, the Sun will be around for a while before your Solar-powered calculator dies out. So let's give the calculator a life of 5 years. 400 units of energy * 5 years = 2,000 units of energy. While the battery is not likely to even survive a year, but let's give it 1 year of life anyway. 1,800 units of energy * 1 year = 1,800 units of energy. A difference of 200 units. Technology advancement has allowed us to push 20 units of pollution to a greater yield. Arguments in terms of performance is another matter.

3) By nano technology, I did not mean "difficult" technology alone. And this one I speak of may be as resourceful as windmills and solar panels. Of course, it must have its faults, but is solar power not cheaper to maintain than constantly burning fossil fuel? This technology is similar to that. What we've learned we can keep for a long time, therefore the pollution caused by the research is more than likely excuseable. A facility that researches for a cleaner environment is also likely to act more environmentally friendly. Say, 200 high school graduate this year. Now, they can all go work somewhere, or they can all research at a environmental research lab. Either way, they will generate waste and pollution, but which has a greater possibility to generate a possible solution towards human polluting? The people will still be there whether there is a research lab for them or not.

Technologies such as the nano fabric I was speaking of, Solar, Wind, Tidal, etc. also create more jobs therefore further enhancing overall quality-of-life for everyone, refer to how that works to economy (further distribution of wealth).

How do you simulate air? Thats like saying we can breathe some sort of alternative to oxygen... (Or maybe it is possible )

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on May 13 2008, 2:22 am by Mini Moose 2707. Reason: off topic

Lets all breathe nitrogen and get killed by the bends slowly and painfully.

lolno

Changing what sort of air we breathe is not the solution, period.

Thats what humanitarians call 'humane' way of using the technology. If that technology developes enough, we use it to turn our respiratory system inside our body into a small fusion reactor, that will be generating our body's energy. Then slowly, nano particles turn your body into machine... that or just create a grey goo.

Seed the ocean to create more tiny organisms that recycle CO2.

Two birds with one stone!
Amass enough energy to fuel a large-scale reverse-combustion reaction to produce Ogyxen and Propane. Gets rid of CO2 (well.. and water.. but, hey, lets get Mars first, then!) and gives us fuel. Alternately, through a similar reaction, we can produce HCO3−. Add Sodium and you get Baking Soda. An infinite supply of baking soda...

Yeah.. it's hard to get rid of something that permeates everything. Plus, Removing CO2 completely will result in immediate death of the human species, so I assume you'd prefer it if we just removed the excess CO2.

Plants can do it.. breathing CO2 would solve the problem. To the lab!

The CO2 people whine about is in the air, not under water.

According to evolution, organisms adapt to what ever environment they're in. So what if humans were exposed to nitrogen or some other gas over time. Wouldn't the lungs have to evolve, in order for it to survive?

No.. we'd die too fast. The answer, my friend, is bioengineering.

My stance is either bioengineering or lots of trees. Or, if we find an infinite power source, some creepy large-scale reaction. That will, sadly, kill trees. Oxygen and water are much more human-friendly then CO2 is.

What kind of virus is trying to fix for their own lives?

If you want to remove the human race, why not remove yourself to prove a point? You're a virus in these forums, not willing to repair but damage.

If we're a virus, we're killing a non-sentient being, so it doesn't really care. However..
We're doing what we can to survive. Nothing more then what viruses do.

Since viruses are one-celled organisms, the discussion is moot.

Your point?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plankton#Biogeochemical_significance
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/06/project-to-harness-plankton-puts-to-sea/
http://www.gdrc.org/oceans/fsheet-02.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/04/040416014043.htm

Viruses aren't composed of cells.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus

My friends father is working on a system for the gov't to require all major CO2 output corporations to reduce their yearly emissions by 10% by 2015. Each company that can reduce more than 10% will get 1 C point per 250lbs extra CO2 they reduce from yearly output. They can then sell their C points to other companies that cant reach their 10% goal. It will be required to reach this goal by 2015 or else your company will be put on probation and ultimately shut down if they cannot fund enough C points by 2016.

Well, won't do too much, but it's a start.

Just a little ps, china is the real abuser of the CO2 'problem', so for anything to really work, we need to convince china to change first...(they outproduce us in CO2 emissions by enough that i strongly suggest you read "An Inconvenient Book" by Glenn Beck.)

(I myself don't exactly think it necessary to reduce CO2 emissions, call me crazy. I believe in the theory of evolution by water, where the salt levels and other important chemicals of water were just right, and used to act as our "blood" if you will. Each cell was directly in contact with the circulatory water, providing O2 to them. Over time the levels of chemicals mandatory to maintain cell life changed, and along with this change the cells changed as well. The theory then goes that we got our own circulatory system to the point we were able to live under water, and provide for ourselves. Over more time life was unsustainable underwater due to the ever changing levels of chemicals in the water, so once again we adapted for land. I believe that eventually, if enough CO2 is produced and it could cause an unsuitable environment, that we will adapt or die. Either option will be part of some divine plan or another and there you have it )

.. I suppose..
My apologies. I revise that statement to 'Viruses aren't living organisms'.