Can technology solve climate change? (Jul 22, 2019)

Despite the efforts made by some countries and companies to cut CO2, emissions keep raising every year. 40 billion metric tons of CO2 are dumped into the atmosphere annually!

New technologies that capture CO2 from the air will play an important role in the fight of climate change but the key factors to succeed are linked to societal aspects. The increment of renewable energies is still being outrun by:

1: Rapid increase of fossil fuel consumption from China and India as their economies keep growing.
2: Lack of care and action by developed nations such as the U.S.
3: Reinforcement of over-consumption habits.

Key aspects to fight climate change besides technological involvement are:

1: Legislation should favour renewable sources of energy.
2: Subsidies need to go towards green energies.
3: A price to emissions should be put in place. At the moment, it is free to discharge CO2 into the atmosphere and it is very expensive to remove it.
4: Consumption of fossil fuels needs to decrease.

Carbon removal technologies and strategies that could be deployed to slow down climate change are:

1: Bioenergy with CO2 capture and storage (BECCS): “These facilities resemble coal-fired power plants, but use recently grown energy crops rather than fossilized swamp plants as fuel and capture the CO2 from combustion” (Biello, David). A BECCS facility does not exists yet.
2: Plants engineered to replace oil (PETRO): “New genetic techniques to enhance photosynthesis allowing plants to capture more CO2” (Biello, David). We need to keep in mind that there is limited land for this.
3: Biofuels could be a solution for aviation. For terrain transportation, electric vehicles supporting better public transportation and share programs are the key.
4: Artificial trees: they already exist in Switzerland, Phoenix and British Columbia but many more would be required.

For more information, read the entire article by David Biello: https://e360.yale.edu/features/how_far_can_technology_go_to_stave_off_climate_change

People together have the power to demand governments and companies to go green. A big movement, Fridays for Future, has already taken the streets of major cities in Europe for many months due to the single action of a courageous teenager, Greta Thunberg.

We invite you to join the next international demonstration September 20th-27th encouraging everyone, regardless of age, to strike. You can create your own event and find further information here: https://globalclimatestrike.net/?source=prophetic-email-blast&utm_medium=email&utm_source=actionkit

Our program helps governments achieve the demands of citizens to go purely green in terms of energy production. We help schools produce their own local solar energy and we deliver energy literacy education.

Join us! https://www.solarforschools.co.uk/register

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