Why is Carbon Capture important?
Carbon capture is important because it provides a solution to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, particularly carbon dioxide (CO2), which is the primary driver of climate change. By capturing and storing CO2 from industrial processes and power plants, carbon capture technologies can significantly mitigate the negative environmental impacts associated with fossil fuel use. It enables us to prevent large quantities of CO2 from being released into the atmosphere and therefore slow down global warming. Moreover, carbon capture also offers potential opportunities for producing cleaner fuels and materials using captured CO2 as a feedstock.
Long answer
Carbon capture is crucial due to its role in addressing climate change and reducing greenhouse gas concentrations in our atmosphere. The burning of fossil fuels for energy production, industrial processes, and transportation has resulted in an exponential increase in CO2 emissions over the past century. These emissions trap heat within the Earth’s atmosphere, leading to global warming and its associated consequences such as rising sea levels, extreme weather events, and habitat destruction.
Carbon capture technologies offer a means to tackle this issue by capturing CO2 before it enters the atmosphere and storing it either underground or repurposing it for other uses. In power plants or industrial facilities, carbon capture can be integrated into existing infrastructures or incorporated into new installations to capture up to 90% of the emitted CO2. This prevents a significant amount of CO2 from being released into the air where it would contribute to climate change.
Furthermore, carbon capture provides possibilities for negative emission technologies (NETs). NETs involve actively removing CO2 from the atmosphere with methods like direct air capture (DAC) – where ambient air is utilized as a source – along with chemical processes that separate CO2 from other gases. These approaches are considered promising strategies because they have the potential to remove already present CO2 rather than relying solely on emission reduction efforts.
The transferability of captured CO2 adds further value to carbon capture technology. This captured CO2 can be utilized as a valuable resource for enhancing oil recovery by injecting it into oil wells, a technique known as enhanced oil recovery (EOR). Moreover, the CO2 can be utilized in various industrial processes, such as the production of plastics or chemicals, creating a market incentive for carbon capture and potentially reducing its costs.
By capturing and repurposing or safely storing CO2 emissions, carbon capture offers realistic pathways to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Implementing these technologies on a large scale can help countries meet their climate targets and make significant progress towards transitioning to a low-carbon economy. Carbon capture plays an essential role in mitigating climate change while enabling continued use of fossil fuels during the global transition to cleaner energy sources.