Geoengineering , or hack Earth ’s climate organization to chill the planet , is a controversial field that promises to eithersave our corporate assesorbring on the Revelation . Now , scientists have discovered a major problem with one pop geoengineering dodging that imply dump a bunch of iron into the ocean to dowse up C dioxide . Basically , the plan is not supported by the geologic record .
exponent of “ iron fertilization ” say that spiking the Pacific Ocean with this critical nutrient will turbo - billing alga , prompting them to draw more carbon copy out of the air . This carbon will eventually sink into the deep ocean and become sequestered . While the conception has come across little practical success , and has make at least oneinternational scandal , the dream of chill our planet with fertilizer while cash in in on carbon paper credits never seems to exit .
https://gizmodo.com/a-massive-and-illegal-geoengineering-project-has-been-d-5952101
But the Earth has already conducted this experiment many , many times . During trash ages , the amount of iron - laden dust settling onto the open of the Pacific Ocean spikes . By examining the geologic record , scientists might be able-bodied to ascertain if this nutty estimation actually exercise .
That ’s exactly what a squad of researchers at Columbia University ’s Lamont - Doherty Earth Observatory has done in the equatorial Pacific . In research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences , Gisela Winckler and her colleagues examined recondite sea sediment cores from three locations across the Pacific that capture the last 500,000 years of geological history , include several chalk ages .
The researcher measured the concentrations of atomic number 56 and opal , which are severally associated with constitutional carbon paper sequestration and the teemingness of shipboard soldier diatom . They also measured thorium-232 , an isotope that indicates the amount of iron - rich dust enter the body of water .
Overall , the study found that ear in atmospherical detritus have had historic small impact on alga in the equatorial Pacific . The reason , the authors argue , is that there ’s a much more important source of branding iron in this part of the ocean : dusty , nutritive - rich water that are brought to the surface by ocean currents in what shipboard soldier biologists call “ upwelling events . ”
“ The amount of iron being supplied by upwelling below the surface is 10 to 100 times greater than the amount of smoothing iron supplied by dust , ” discipline conscientious objector - author Bob Anderson told Gizmodo . “ It just was n’t enough to make a divergence . ”
Anderson remark that smoothing iron fertilization might play a more authoritative role in the Southern Ocean — a huge biological desert encircling Antarctica . Here , algae relish less upwelling and receive strong Fe limit . His team is currently probe Southern Ocean sediment cores to see if there ’s any grounds for past smoothing iron impregnation episode .
Even if certain parts of the sea are antiphonal to iron , Anderson said that calculated fertilization could have dangerous side effect — like loot the deep ocean of oxygen and suffocating everything that lives there . In general , tinker with elemental cycle tends to have unlooked-for consequence that spell out bad news show for ecology . Just wait at thedead zona in the Gulf of Mexico(fueled by too much N into the water ) , or any import ofanthropogenic mood change(fueled by too much carbon paper in the air ) .
“ In principle , I think iron addition to the Southern Ocean could make a difference of opinion in term of draw down atmospheric CO2 , ” Anderson said . “ But I reckon we have to be very thrifty , turn over the ecologic impairment that could be done . We ’d have to be very desperate in my opinion . ”
ClimateClimate changeGeologygeosciences
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