Results: Carbon Capture Rocks!

Researchers working in Iceland have discovered a new way to trap the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) deep underground: by changing it into rock. Results published this week in "Science" show that injecting CO2 into volcanic rocks triggers a reaction that rapidly forms new carbonate minerals—potentially locking up the gas forever. The technique has to clear some high hurdles to become commercially viable. But scientists say the project, dubbed CarbFix, offers a ray of hope for beleaguered efforts to fight climate change by capturing and storing CO2 from power plants. Have you heard about this discovery?

Measurements of dissolved carbon in the groundwater suggested that more than 95% of the injected carbon had already been converted into calcite and other minerals. "It was a huge surprise that the carbonation happened so fast (after less than two years)," says Juerg Matter, a geologist with CarbFix at the University of Southampton in the UK. Laboratory tests by Matter's team and others, along with computer modeling, had previously suggested that carbonation in basalt would take at least a decade. The speedy carbonation "means this method could be a viable way to store CO2 underground—permanently, and without risk of leakage," Matter says. Does this give you hope that a real storage solution is finally possible?

But even CarbFix's own scientists acknowledge that the biggest obstacle to carbon capture storage in basalt is financial: Power companies have little incentive to pursue it. "Without a price on carbon emissions, there's no business case," admits Matter, who hopes policymakers will create such an incentive. Otherwise, projects in basalt could suffer the same fate as the dozens of conventional CCS projects around the world that have failed to be commercialized. Do you think governments and/or powder companies should be doing more to fund this project?