Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Think Twice

As I'm sure many of you know, Planktos has been all over the press recently. Not surprisingly, a surplus of good press is often followed with debate.

The convincing arguments in these debates (some of the arguments are non-factual) raise three main questions:

1) Are carbon credits an excuse for companies to pollute?
2) Is the ocean a sacred realm that we should leave to mother nature?
3) Should a for-profit company be allowed to contribute towards scientific research?

To be honest, the libertarian side of me wants to squash the protesters with a big anvil, but really, I know that public image matters to me. So here's my two cents -- overall, i think we are not in much disagreement at all. Planktos actually shares many of these concerns. (Feel free to hit the comment button if you want to debate anything.)

To address question 1, it is important to know that there is no source of carbon-free energy that is both feasible and immediate on a large scale, aside from nuclear energy. Trust me -- I spent a year in college getting my engineering specialization in energy technology, and I learned
countless depressing lessons about our energy future. A silicon solar panel takes 40% of its lifespan to produce the same amount of energy that was used to make the cell. Ethanol uses even more energy in production, and also requires vast amounts of land and water. Hydro power, wind energy, bio diesel, and hydrogen fuel all suffer from insurmountable limitations. In the end, nuclear energy is our only viable option, but the idea of all that nuclear waste is a little hard to stomach.

Because of this limitation in technology, the debate about carbon credits has more to do with motivation than with carbon. It's true that a moderate amount of research money could be allocated to alternative energy research if it weren't being used for sequestration technology. There is also a fear that companies will purchase carbon credits instead of improving energy efficiency to meet greenhouse gas emission standards, thereby avoiding the problem instead of addressing it. (Fortunately, laws are being written that will prevent this.) Personally, I believe that big polluters need to be held accountable for their actions, and this is one way to redistribute their capital into costly ecosystem restoration projects.


Carbon credits can be implemented right away whereas feasible zero-emission technologies are decades down the road. Planktos does not think that carbon credits are the solution to global warming, nor do we think that they are better than emissions reductions. It seems obvious to me that reducing emissions AND researching new technologies would be the best path, so let's do both!


To address question number two: YES, I am in absolute positive agreement.


But only in principle.

Irreversible changes have already begun to occur in the oceans. Increased atmospheric CO2 has caused an increase in ocean acidity, and critters are literally going to dissolve as the rising acidity of their surroundings burns them away. Overfishing has vastly affected the oceanic food web. Coral reefs are constantly dying (actually, dissolving) and entire habitats are going extinct. In an ideal world, we would have stayed clear of ocean ecosystems a long time ago, but even if we leave the oceans completely, the changes we have made to the land surface will continue to affect marine ecosystems.


Wind-blown dust is a major provider of vitamins and minerals for plants growing in the middle of the ocean, and entire habitats die when the dust doesn't arrive. The satellite photograph on the right shows a dust storm blowing off the coast of Africa. This particular source delivers iron to thousands of square miles of Pacific and sends phosphates as far as the Amazon rain forest. These habitats depend on the dust to deliver these vital nutrients, and anthropogenic changes in land use have irreversibly altered the amount of dust that gets picked up by the wind. In the ocean, the supply of iron is constantly declining, and the marine environment suffers as a result.

Mother Nature may not have intended for people to sprinkle dust into the water, but a fair amount of scientific evidence suggests that it will be helpful. The patch of ocean that Planktos plans to fertilize is hundreds of times smaller than a natural, wind-born patch (the dust storm shown above is the size of Spain) thereby providing a large enough area for optimal research conditions, while still respecting the sanctity of the oceans. Data gathered from this plankton bloom will be used to verify (or deny) the influence of plankton on global warming, and will expand the literature about iron fertilization as described in IPCC 2007 and other documents. We are confident that our project will be successful, however it should be known that future blooms will not occur if initial tests show any risky or unnatural effects. We want the ocean to thrive!

Which brings us to question 3.

We are a research company. We are fully engaged in generating scientific results and comprehensive data, and our techniques mimic those used by iron fretilization experiments conducted by acedemic institutions in the past. The only thing that separates us is the way we fund these projects. Previous experiments conducted by academics were funded by government grants; Planktos uses self-generated funds that come from investors and buyers in the carbon market. Just because we depend on sales to fund our projects, we are not in any way profit-motivated or unconcerned with the environment -- why would we choose such a environmental project if this were true?

Of course, I understand that this is not the only conflict for scientists; the transition from research to application is challenging in every field of science. If I were studying the effectiveness of a new fertilizer, and a company began to commercialize the product during my experiment, I would feel robbed of the applicability of my research. As a company, this is a problem that is out of our control. But I assure you that Planktos conducts only the utmost quality of research, and that we are open to new ideas. If you're an ocean scientist and you are interested in the Planktos project, let us know. We are always eager to hear about new research, and willing to listen to individual points of view.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am definitely not a scientist, but I think what you guys are doing is great. Carbon offsetting is definitely not the answer to global warming, but it is what is currently available and the best current solution to the problem.

The only issue I have with the fertilization project is the location of the initial seeding. Why was the Galapagos chosen for this? It seems that such a delicate ecosystem like the one in the Galapagos is the last that should be disturbed, only after conclusive evidence that this has positive effects and no negative effects. I'm sure that the site was not randomly chosen, so I am just curious as to the rationale behind that particular site and whether you think it could cause any harm to that special ecosystem with all those wonderful animals.

I am long PLKT and hope that this works out, mainly for the sake of the environment, but also so we can all make some money in the process.

Laura said...

Jon,
Thank you for your support.
To answer your question, we have chosen our bloom site for several reasons. First, iron fertilization only works in areas with low iron supplies, but with an abundance of other nutrients for the plankton to grow. Multiple past studies of iron fertilization have taken place in the same location as our bloom, and they were successful. More importantly, the project location is actually hundreds of miles to the west of the Galapagos. Ocean currents in that area tend to flow to the west as well, so any drifting of the plankton will move away from the islands, thereby protecting the Galapagos ecosystem from any disturbance. A more accurate description of the bloom location would be 'equatorial Pacific,' but 'Galapagos' has often been used simply because it is the closest land mass.
Laura

Anonymous said...

Thanks, Laura. That's reassuring.

Anonymous said...

I'm all for reducing pollution and improving our environment, but I believe most of these carbon credit programs are an excuse to suck up money from people who are too naive to realize what is going on. I hope we never get into a situation where the government mandates carbon credits.

The idea that this will do anything to curb global warming is ridiculus. Secondly, very wealthy people and large companies have more money and will be less affected by carbon credits. The people affected will be the average persons around the world.

As I implied above, I am all for alternative energy sources and keeping our environment clean. The problem is that many people want to take this to an extreme that is going to wreck our economy and punish the lower and middle classes.

Everyone, please use common sense and think for yourselves before you go around supporting every project just because it is "GREEN." Everyone says they're going GREEN these days but they can't even tell you what that really means.

Anonymous said...

This is ridiculous. Use cheap deoderant to cover up the stench of mankinds past years of distruction and greed. (anonymous, the government WILL mandate carbon credits, it's business) Of all the places to disturb, our oceans are more sensitive and less understood than any other eco-system on Earth. As a small business owner with an insatiable desire for the truth, I am not a pessimist. However, I can see that the costs and risks involved here are so far beyond any CO2 reductions we could claim before Planktos closes the doors and disappears to a remote tropical island to live out their days enjoying the exact ecosystem that was in the crosshairs of your truly.

Anonymous said...

The standing stock of marine plant biomass is more or less meaningless
as it is generally small even integrated up globally (in contrast to land vegetation). Therefore, the arguement of the possibility to store anthropogenic carbon in marine biomass is nonsense. What you produce is remineralised to almost 100% again. Increasing marine plant production artificially increases locally the danger for N2O or CH4 production - gases with a substantially higher specific greenhouse potential than CO2.