Bread and Circuses

Is technology going to save us from climate change? Are fancy new machines being invented that will suck carbon out of the air and make everything all right again?

No.

➡️ https://heimildin.is/grein/24581/climeworks-capture-fails-to-cover-its-own-emissions/

Climeworks, a leading carbon capture company in Iceland, has not accomplished any of its lofty goals. They are drawing only a fraction of CO₂ from the atmosphere that they claimed would be possible.

Not only that, but the company's own emissions actually *exceed* the amount of carbon they have managed to capture. They are making the problem worse, not better.

Capitalist technology cannot solve the problems caused by capitalist technology. We have to change course.

#Science #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #Capitalism #Degrowth

Climeworks’ capture fails to cover its own emissions

The carbon capture company Climeworks only captures a fraction of the CO2 it promises its machines can capture. The company is failing to carbon offset the emissions resulting from its operations – which have grown rapidly in recent years.

Heimildin
May 21 at 1:00pmWeb
Show threadPainting_SquirrelMay 21
@breadandcircuses
I really want to smack people who propose carbon capture on the head with some basic textbooks on thermodynamics and economics.
Due to thermodynamics, capturing carbon or of the atmosphere requires massive amounts of energy. Where is that energy supposed to come from?
Capturing carbon from the atmosphere will not give you anything that can be further utilised and therefore can't make a profit in itself. Why would it be done in a capitalist framework then?
Makes no bloody sense
Show threadᴊᴏʟʟʏ ᴍɴᴇᴍᴏɴɪᴄMay 21
@painting_squirrel @breadandcircuses They know. Carbon capture is a PR excercise to keep the fossil industry in business.
Show threadMichael de PodestaMay 21

@painting_squirrel @breadandcircuses

Yes.

I wrote about the energy required to capture 1 billion tonnes per year.

https://protonsforbreakfast.wordpress.com/2025/03/02/direct-air-capture-of-one-billion-tonnes-of-carbon-dioxide-per-year/

But the big thing, is that if we had that energy resource available now, the first thing we should be doing is avoiding burning fossil fuels in the first place!

Direct Air Capture of One Billion Tonnes of Carbon Dioxide per year?

2 March 2025 Friends, back in September 2024, I wrote about my increasing scepticism of the feasibility of projects seeking to capture CO2 directly from the atmosphere. I had been paying one such c…

Protons for Breakfast
Show threadrobcorneliusMay 21

@breadandcircuses

The only 100% effective carbon capture system is to leave the damn stuff in the ground.

Show threadTomWilsonYEGMay 21

@robcornelius @breadandcircuses

The best way to stop the extraction of O & G is to stop using it.

Show threadJo-chin up, elbows up.May 21
@breadandcircuses
It was ALWAYS a scam to bait greenwashing capitalism who want to continue and grow consumption without reducing waste or increasing quality & longevity. They needed the dream pie in the sky tech to escape the knowledge of the harms to humanity that they do daily and pretend it will all be okay, they are the heroes. Doubling and tripling down as they make hell on earth. Investors love that shit. They think it buys them time when they sell their eternal life.
Show threadMatthewToadAgainMay 23

@JoBlakely @breadandcircuses Unfortunately moral hazard applies to EVERY green technology. And many other policies.

Politicians will use any excuse to continue burning oil and gas.

Carbon capture and storage? Direct air capture? "Synthetic fuels"? Biofuels? Offsets? Carbon markets? Solar geoengineering?

They'll use any non-existent unreliable or implausibly expensive sci-fi technology to justify continued fossil fuels.

Either because they're in the pocket of the fossil fuel industry, or because they're scared of newspapers who are, or because they need to impress upon some tiny target demographic how they value the great god "GROWTH" over all other considerations and especially over all those environmental protesters and manifesto pledges.

But they'll happily use real technologies too. Rewilding? Tree planting? Even renewables? Everything gets thrown into the offset machine - whether it's actually measured or just an excuse.

Unfortunately at 429ppm and consistently over 1.5C, moral hazard isn't our only consideration.

Temperatures are *already* at dangerous levels, and will increase further even with radical cuts to carbon emissions.

Also, it's not just the climate crisis, it's the climate and biodiversity crisis.

We do in fact need to remove large amounts of carbon from the atmosphere. The best way to do that is rewilding, which requires 1) we stop burning biofuels and 2) we stop eating beef (at a minimum).

And given that there is evidence of positive feedbacks already happening, and tipping points may be very close, it's quite possible that we will in fact need emergency measures such as solar geoengineering.

Also, very small amounts of true synthetic fuels probably are needed, and for a few industrial processes carbon capture is unfortunately the only plausible medium term solution (while in most other areas it makes no sense whatsoever). Degrowth is vital, but technology is also needed.

The difference is of course how we approach this.

Do we use rewilding as an excuse to burn more fossil fuels, whether that's as an offset or merely a political excuse?

Or do we use it to dig ourselves out of an emergency, while simultaneously doing everything possible to rapidly cut carbon emissions, deforestation etc, including socialist degrowth policies?

That's the choice.

Show threadRalfMaximusMay 21

@breadandcircuses

Of course they've accomplished their goals: $50+ million in capital raised.

Show threadBread and CircusesMay 21
@ralfmaximus Heh, you're right!