Desert 'carbon farming' to curb CO2

1 August 2013

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By Matt McGrath

Environment reporter, BBC News

Scientists say that planting big numbers of jatropha trees in desert areas might be a reliable way of curbing emissions of CO2.

Dubbed "carbon farming", scientists state the concept is economically competitive with modern carbon capture and storage tasks.

But critics say the concept might be have unexpected, negative impacts including driving up food prices.

The research has actually been released, external in the journal Earth System Dynamics.

Seeds of modification

Jatropha curcas is a plant that stemmed in Central America and is really well adapted to extreme conditions including incredibly dry deserts.

It is already grown as a biofuel, external in some parts of the world since its seeds can produce oil.

In this research study, German scientists revealed that a person hectare of jatropha could catch up to 25 tonnes of co2 from the atmosphere every year. The researchers based their price quotes on trees currently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.

"The outcomes are overwhelming," said Prof Klaus Becker, from the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.

"There was excellent growth, a good reaction from these plants. I feel there will be no issue trying it on a much larger 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 twenty years duration.

The researchers state that a critical aspect of the strategy would be the schedule of desalination centers. This means that initially, any plantations would be confined to seaside locations.

They are wishing to trials in desert locations of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker says that unlike other plans that just offset the carbon that people produce, the planting of jatropha might be an excellent, brief term option to climate modification.

"I believe it is an excellent idea due to the fact that we are really drawing out carbon dioxide from the environment - and it is completely various between drawing out and avoiding."

According to the researcher's estimations the costs of suppressing co2 through 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 number of nations are currently trialling this technology, external however it has yet to be deployed commercially.

Growing jatropha not just soaks up CO2 however has other benefits. The plants would assist to make desert locations more habitable, and the plant's seeds can be gathered for biofuel say the scientists, providing 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 area are not persuaded. They indicate the truth that in 2007 and 2008 great deals of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, specifically in Africa. But a lot of these endeavors ended in tears,, external as the plants were not extremely successful in coping with dry conditions.

Lucy Hurn is the biofuels project manager for the charity, Actionaid. She says that while jatropha was as soon as viewed as the great, green hope the truth was very different.

"When jatropha was presented it was seen as a miracle crop, it would grow on scrubland or limited land," she said.

"But there are frequently people who need marginal land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that area - we would not class the land as limited."

She mentioned that jatropha is extremely harmful and can pollute the land it is grown on, even in a desert. And she also had concerns about the fairness of the concept.

"It is still someone else's land. Why go in and grow these huge plantations to deal with an issue these individuals didn't really cause?"

Follow Matt on Twitter, external.

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Related web links

Universität Hohenheim

European Geosciences Union

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