Cleaning up our atmosphere

Can fighting climate change be as simple as a little housekeeping?

Spaceball One transformed into Mega Maid in the movie Spaceballs

As ridiculous as this probably seems, our government appears to be taking cues from the movie Spaceballs. Today I present you another case of fact being stranger than (science) fiction.

While the Mega Maid in Spaceballs was employed by Dark Helmet for the purpose of sucking all breathable air from the atmosphere of the planet Druida, the U.S. government has a similar idea with a different purpose. As the New York Times (among other publications) is reporting, the U.S. government intends to spend $1.2 billion on a giant vacuum intended to suck greenhouse gases out of the Earth’s atmosphere.

Part of the mechanism from “Direct Air Capture” plant

No, this will not be accomplished by launching a Transformer-like spaceship into orbit. This will not be manufactured by a company like Bissell, Kirby, or Shark. It will be a multi-building, perhaps no more than a few stories tall (based on images of a similar unit now operating in Iceland) using giant fans to draw in air from which carbon dioxide will be removed via chemical reaction and then stored deep underground.

Rendering of a carbon capture plant design by the company Carbon Engineering

It is quite amazing to see these structures. According to various articles, this technology could remove from the atmosphere the CO2 equivalent of the emissions of almost 500,000 gas-powered automobiles. Wow! This sounds amazing! Why wouldn’t we want it?

Let’s ignore for the moment that the government has no constitutional authority to make such an investment (nowhere does the Constitution provide the government authority to provide money to private businesses for any reason). There are quite a few issues to unpack regarding this self-effacing “science.”

First let’s consider the space required. It’s interesting that proponents claim that the number of trees required to absorb much of this carbon dioxide would require too much space yet those same people have no compunction about razing forests to erect allegedly “green” wind and solar farms. The land it would take for unreliable wind and solar to attempt to provide power for a city like Manhattan would require more land than Manhattan itself (The dirty truth about clean energy , Nuclear power and the resulting melt-downs…). But I digress.

Then again, perhaps this is a reasonable train of thought. Those same proponents also argue that such large swaths of trees require a lot of water to survive, water needed for other purposes (I guess rain won’t suffice?). Those same proponents also support using brine pools to extract lithium from the earth for car batteries (see image below), a process that consumes water that could otherwise be used for farm irrigation and drinking. But…we’re being green and saving the planet!

South American lithium fields - looks very green, doesn’t it?

Now, take a look at the picture above of the proposed Carbon Engineering capture plant and those below of actual capture plants in Iceland built by Climeworks. Do you imagine they take up less space than the trees that could also be absorbing CO2?

Climework’s Orca project in Hengill, Iceland

Climework’s Mammoth plant in Hellisheidi, Iceland

Do you notice something else in common? All the land upon which they are built is no longer “green” (if it was to begin with). So, we’re eliminating real green to be fake green?

Here’s another puzzle. Note the locations of these “vacuums.” Do you see any signs of civilization in the vicinity? If they are nowhere near the source of the carbon emissions, how exactly are they sucking up all those carbon emissions? But…science.

Further enigmas abound. These structures do not appear to be tall, no more than a few stories in stature. Is all the CO2 concentrated near ground level? If not, would such a low edifice have sufficient reach to draw in CO2 from higher up in the atmosphere?

This leads to additional questions. How strong is the intake from these ginormous fans? From what distance is it able to draw in air? Are they strong enough that birds and flying insects might be drawn into them and killed? We know impact with windmills kills innumerable birds and insects each year (and heat from solar farms fries many birds mid-flight).

Back to some of the claims, while one CNN article cites U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm stating that these carbon capture projects are expected to remove from the atmosphere an amount of CO2 equivalent to taking 500,000 cars off the road, the Climeworks Orca plant is capable of removing the equivalent of 800 cars worth of CO2 emissions from the air each year, and the Mammoth plant approximately 7200 cars. It seems Miss Granholm’s 500,000 figure may have a brown tinge and unpleasant odor emanating from it due to the location from which it was sourced. Otherwise, to reach that number, over 50 plants equivalent to the Climeworks Mammoth plant will need to be established.

Speaking of, when you look at all of those mechanical devices, what might be another consideration in operating these carbon capture monstrosities? How about…power? These plants require tremendous amounts of power to run. The Climeworks Iceland plants are powered by geothermal energy provided by Iceland’s ON Power (according to Climeworks’ website). How, then, will the two plants in the U.S., costing us taxpayers $1.2 billion, be powered?

According to the aforementioned CNN article, the company building the plant in Louisiana (the other will be in Texas) intends to purchase “clean energy from the local utility.” Eventually they plan to use “renewable energy” which means…what? Solar? Wind? Do they realize how much land will be required for those unreliable energy sources that are far from the green solutions they are purported to be?

There are so many more questions and issues I could raise (one of storage and transport, for instance - yeah, Climeworks doesn’t handle that part), but perhaps the biggest conundrum is, why are we spending so much time and energy talking about carbon capture, when we should instead be discussing science capture. “Science” has been captured by government and big business/money. No longer do the Experts™ soundly follow the scientific method. Instead, they follow the money, or the commands of those who govern. “Science” has become big business both for private industry and for government. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a committee within the United Nations responsible for assessing all science related to climate change. The IPCC has a vested interest in convincing people that anthropogenic (man-made) climate change is not only real, but it’s a dire problem (think: WHO, Pfizer et. al., and Covid).

This image depicts what they’re telling us they are battling to slow earth’s warming:

Representation of 400ppm CO2 in the atmosphere.

The above is a graphic representation of 400 parts-per-million (0.04%) CO2 in the atmosphere, the current estimated concentration. The graphic is 1,000 pixels by 1,000 pixels (1000x1000 = 1,000,000), and 400 random 1-pixel red dots have been placed in it. Can’t you just see how that causes heat to be trapped in the Earth’s atmosphere? For anyone who questions that, however, the Experts™ have the answer: "The absolute value of CO2 concentrations is irrelevant. It is the change that matters” (this, according to Richard Engelen, deputy director of Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Services (CAMS), the European Union’s (EU) as quoted in Reuters).

There is a lot to unpack in all of the climate change arguments, but some are so starkly absurd as to be farcical. Ignoring that even NASA admits that CO2 is “essential to life on Earth,” what do we do with the fact that man is only responsible for about 3.8% of the CO2 emitted into the atmosphere? How do we prevent or eliminate the other 96% that is caused by volcanic activity and other natural processes?

Not to mention, CO2 isn’t even the most abundant greenhouse gas in the atmosphere - according to NASA, the most abundant greenhouse gas is water vapor. But, but, but…”because the warming ocean increases the amount of it in our atmosphere, it is not a direct cause of climate change.” Ah…we can’t tax the oceans, so it can’t possibly be a direct cause. Oh, and guess where NASA is sourcing information. Did you guess IPCC?

If you doubt the control aspect or financial aspect of the fight against carbon and the push for carbon capture, consider that Climeworks sells their carbon removal service. That’s right - you can pay Climeworks for “carbon offsets.” For the truly conscientious individual, subscriptions are available as well (these are not yet available, however, for business purchase).

After all, if they were serious about CO2, wouldn’t they ban bubbly beverages? How much CO2 is released into the atmosphere each year as it emerges from glasses of soda, mugs of beer, and bottles of sparkling wine? Why not outlaw these dastardly drinks so that the emissions from the fermentation process, or the filling of CO2 tanks used to infuse soft drinks will not warm the earth? How much “pollution” escapes from tools powered by CO2-propellant canisters? There are plenty of places from which carbon dioxide arises other than gasoline-powered automobiles.

Oh, and that $1.2 billion we started out with? As I wrote this article, I found it is actually just a portion of the $3.5 billion the DoE is pulling from the funds set aside in the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (H.R. 3684). $3.5 billion dollars going to build four carbon capture plants because, subsidies. Can you say, “Solyndra”? Anyone care to speculate who is receiving kickbacks?

Yes, we should care about our environment, but let’s stop pretending that this dollar-devouring demagoguery from the climate change cultists is the existential crisis they make it out to be. This is little more than another wealth-redistribution scheme that not only allows government to take and spend your money unconstitutionally, but which they use to foist upon us regulations that make our lives less convenient and more costly. Investing in a humungous Hoover certainly isn’t helping anyone; at least, not any of us among we the people.