Desert 'carbon farming' to CO2

1 August 2013

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By Matt McGrath

Environment correspondent, BBC News

Scientists say that planting big numbers of jatropha trees in desert areas might be an efficient method of curbing emissions of CO2.

Dubbed "carbon farming", researchers state the concept is economically competitive with state-of-the-art carbon capture and storage jobs.

But critics state the idea might be have unanticipated, negative impacts consisting of increasing food prices.

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

Seeds of change

Jatropha curcas is a plant that came from Central America and is very well adjusted to severe conditions consisting of very dry deserts.

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

In this study, German researchers revealed that a person hectare of jatropha could record approximately 25 tonnes of co2 from the environment every year. The researchers based their estimates 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 good growth, a great response from these plants. I feel there will be no issue attempting it on a much larger scale, for instance 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 cars and trucks and trucks in Germany over a 20 year duration.

The scientists state that an important component of the strategy would be the availability of desalination centers. This suggests that initially, any plantations would be confined to coastal areas.

They are wishing to develop larger trials in desert areas of Oman or Qatar. Prof Becker states that unlike other plans that just balance out the carbon that people produce, the planting of jatropha might be an excellent, brief term service to climate modification.

"I think it is a good idea because we are truly drawing out co2 from the environment - and it is completely various in between extracting and preventing."

According to the researcher's computations the expenses of suppressing carbon dioxide by means of the planting of trees would be in 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 variety of countries are presently trialling this technology, external but it has yet to be released commercially.

Growing jatropha not only soaks up CO2 but has other advantages. The plants would help to make desert areas more habitable, and the plant's seeds can be harvested for biofuel say the researchers, supplying an economic return.

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

But other specialists in this location are not encouraged. They point to the reality that in 2007 and 2008 great deals of jatropha trees were planted for biofuel, particularly in Africa. But much of these ventures ended in tears,, external as the plants were not really successful in handling dry conditions.

Lucy Hurn is the biofuels campaign manager for the charity, Actionaid. She states that while jatropha was as soon as seen as the terrific, green hope the reality was really different.

"When jatropha was introduced it was viewed as a wonder crop, it would grow on scrubland or marginal land," she said.

"But there are often people who need limited land to graze their animals, they are getting food from that area - we wouldn't class the land as marginal."

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

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

Follow Matt on Twitter, external.

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Related web links

Universität Hohenheim

European Geosciences Union

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