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 could be an effective way of suppressing emissions of CO2.
Dubbed "carbon farming", scientists state the idea is financially competitive with high-tech carbon capture and storage tasks.
But critics state the concept could be have unexpected, negative impacts consisting of driving up food costs.
The research study has actually been released, external in the journal Earth System Dynamics.
Seeds of modification
Jatropha curcas is a plant that came from Central America and is very well adjusted to harsh conditions including incredibly arid deserts.
It is already grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world because its seeds can produce oil.
In this research study, German researchers showed that one hectare of jatropha could capture as much as 25 tonnes of carbon dioxide from the environment every year. The researchers based their estimates on growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.
"The results are overwhelming," said Prof Klaus Becker, from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.
"There was great development, a good reaction from these plants. I feel there will be no problem trying it on a much bigger 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 soak up all the CO2 produced by vehicles and trucks in Germany over a 20 year period.
The scientists say that a crucial component of the strategy would be the accessibility of desalination centers. This indicates that initially, any plantations would be confined to coastal locations.
They are hoping to establish larger trials in desert locations 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 good, short term service to climate change.
"I think it is a good concept since we are actually drawing out co2 from the environment - and it is entirely various between drawing out and avoiding."
According to the scientist's computations the expenses of suppressing carbon dioxide via the planting of trees would be between 42 and 63 euros per tonne. This makes it competitive with other methods, such as the more high tech carbon capture and storage, external (CCS).
A variety of nations are currently trialling this technology, external however it has yet to be deployed commercially.
Growing jatropha not just takes in 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 state the researchers, supplying an economic return.
"Jatropha is ideal to be developed into biokerosene - it is even much better than biodiesel," said Prof Becker.
But other specialists in this location are not persuaded. They indicate the truth that in 2007 and 2008 large numbers of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, particularly in Africa. But a lot of these ventures ended in tears,, external as the plants were not very successful in dealing with dry conditions.
Lucy Hurn is the biofuels campaign supervisor for the charity, Actionaid. She says that while jatropha was once viewed as the excellent, green hope the reality was extremely different.
"When jatropha was presented it was viewed as a wonder crop, it would grow on scrubland or limited land," she stated.
"But there are often people who need limited land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that location - we would not class the land as minimal."
She explained that jatropha is extremely poisonous and can pollute the land it is grown on, even in a desert. And she likewise had concerns about the fairness of the concept.
"It is still somebody else's land. Why go in and grow these enormous plantations to handle a problem these individuals didn't really trigger?"
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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