Desert 'carbon farming' to suppress CO2

1 August 2013

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By Matt McGrath

Environment correspondent, BBC News

Scientists state that planting great deals of jatropha trees in desert locations might be an efficient way of suppressing emissions of CO2.

Dubbed "carbon farming", researchers state the idea is financially competitive with modern carbon capture and storage jobs.

But critics state the concept might be have unforeseen, unfavorable impacts including driving up food prices.

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

Seeds of change

Jatropha curcas is a plant that came from Central America and is very well adapted to extreme conditions consisting of incredibly arid .

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

In this study, German scientists showed that one hectare of jatropha could catch approximately 25 tonnes of carbon dioxide from the environment every year. The scientists based their estimates on trees presently growing in trial plots in Egypt and in the Negev desert.

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

"There was good growth, a great response from these plants. I feel there will be no problem attempting it on a much larger scale, for instance 10 thousand hectares in the start," he said.

According to the researchers a plantation that would cover three percent of the Arabian desert would soak up all the CO2 produced by cars and trucks in Germany over a twenty years period.

The scientists say that an important component of the strategy would be the schedule of desalination facilities. This implies that at first, any plantations would be restricted to coastal areas.

They are intending to establish bigger trials in desert areas of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker says that unlike other plans that simply offset the carbon that people produce, the planting of jatropha could be a good, short-term solution to environment change.

"I think it is a great concept because we are really extracting carbon dioxide from the environment - and it is completely different in between extracting and avoiding."

According to the scientist's estimations the costs of curbing carbon dioxide through the planting of trees would be between 42 and 63 euros per tonne. This makes it competitive with other strategies, such as the more high tech carbon capture and storage, external (CCS).

A number of nations are presently trialling this technology, external however it has yet to be deployed commercially.

Growing jatropha not only absorbs CO2 however has other benefits. The plants would help to make desert locations more habitable, and the plant's seeds can be harvested for biofuel say the researchers, offering an economic return.

"Jatropha is perfect to be developed into biokerosene - it is even better than biodiesel," said Prof Becker.

But other experts in this area are not encouraged. They indicate the truth that in 2007 and 2008 large numbers of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, particularly in Africa. But much of these endeavors ended in tears,, external as the plants were not really effective in dealing with dry conditions.

Lucy Hurn is the biofuels campaign supervisor for the charity, Actionaid. She says that while jatropha was as soon as viewed as the excellent, green hope the reality was really different.

"When jatropha was presented it was seen as a wonder crop, it would grow on scrubland or marginal land," she stated.

"But there are typically people who require limited land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that location - we wouldn't class the land as minimal."

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

"It is still someone else's land. Why go in and grow these enormous plantations to handle an issue these people didn't actually cause?"

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Related internet links

Universität Hohenheim

European Geosciences Union

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