New Atlas

Environment Audio available

Earth has room to reforest an area the size of the United States, but it’s no silver bullet for climate change

Michael Irving July 4, 2019

How effective would planting new trees be to combat climate change? A new study from ETH Zurich has found that Earth has room to reforest an area the size of the US, and calculates what benefits that might bring. But of course, the story is more complicated than just planting a trillion new trees.

A new study has quantified how much land is available for reforestation, and how effective that ...

Environment Audio available

Clingy carbon capture substance can be reused indefinitely

Michael Irving January 31, 2019

Fossil fuel-fired power plants will be pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere for a long time to come. Now researchers at ORNL have developed a new substance that could effectively soak up carbon from coal-fired power plant emissions, using much less energy than existing methods.

A new substance can scrub carbon dioxide from power plant emissions more efficiently than existing technology

Energy Audio available

Carbon capture system turns CO2 into electricity and hydrogen fuel

Michael Irving January 21, 2019

Inspired by the ocean’s role as a natural carbon sink, researchers at Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) and Georgia Tech have developed a new system that absorbs CO2 and produces electricity and useable hydrogen fuel.

Scientists have developed a new device that can absorb CO2 and produce electricity and hydrogen fuel

Environment

Holier-than-thou: Highly porous powder captures double the carbon

Nick Lavars January 2, 2019

A promising new technology developed at Canada’s University of Waterloo hinges on a special kind of powder that could be applied as a filter at power plants to gather CO2 molecules at the source, and is claimed to offer double the efficiency of the materials that are currently available.

A new powder developed in Canada has the potential to give carbon capture technologies a huge ...

Environment Audio available

Coca-Cola mineral water to use captured carbon for fizz

Nick Lavars December 18, 2018

The soda industry is one place where you can bet there will be a massive demand for the CO2, and its about to get a little bit cleaner with Coca-Cola HBC signing a deal to use CO2 captured by Swiss startup Climeworks in its Valser mineral water.

Valser mineral water, soon to feature bubbles from the air

Environment Audio available

Climeworks: The ambitious startup out to reverse climate change by capturing carbon from the air

Nick Lavars October 12, 2018

Climeworks is a Swiss company at the vanguard of carbon capture technology, and having just completed a year-long pilot project collecting C02 at the world’s first negative emissions power plant, is rather optimistic about the way things are headed.

Climeworks recently carried out a carbon capture pilot project at the Hellisheidi geothermal power plant in ...

Materials

New material pulls carbon from the air for self-repair

Michael Irving October 11, 2018

It’s not enough to reduce our carbon output – we need to actively remove some from the atmosphere. On a small scale MIT engineers have developed a new material that can suck carbon out of the air and use it to get stronger or patch itself up.

The new hydrogel material (dark green) contains chloroplasts (light green) that let it absorb carbon from ...

Biology

Microbial "spacesuits" help bacteria convert CO2 to useful chemicals

Michael Irving October 1, 2018

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley have now developed “spacesuits” that wrap around bacteria to not only protect them from the elements, but turn them into biohybrids that capture carbon dioxide and turn it into useful chemicals.

A diagram of the metal organic framework (MOF) structure (left) and how it interacts with bacteria ...

Energy

MIT's lithium-carbon dioxide battery generates power and solidifies carbon

Michael Irving September 24, 2018

As the world warms up, we can’t just keep belching all our carbon dioxide out into the atmosphere. Now researchers at MIT have found another way to reuse this unwanted element – build lithium-carbon dioxide batteries.

A scanning electron microscope image of the carbon cathode of MIT's new lithium-carbon dioxide battery. Over ...

Environment

Pilot plant demonstrates low-cost conversion of CO2 into fuel

Michael Irving June 7, 2018

Direct air capture (DAC) systems have been discussed as a possibility for removing CO2 from the air, but until recently seemed too expensive. After running a pilot plant for three years, Carbon Engineering (CE) has broken down the costs of a DAC system and found how it can work.

Rendering of Carbon Engineering's air contactor design. This unit would be one of several that would ...