Applied Mineralogy Group webinar: The potential of alkaline mineral materials for CO₂ removal from the atmosphere – 26 November 2020

On Thursday 26th November at 15:00 GMT, Dr Phil Renforth (Heriot-Watt University) is leading an online talk on behalf of the Applied Mineralogy Group, called ‘The potential of alkaline mineral materials for CO₂ removal from the atmosphere’. This is the first in a new series of ‘Open Geoscience Talks’.
Here’s the talk abstract:
“In addition to extensive reduction in greenhouse gas emissions we may also need to remove billions of tonnes of CO₂ per year from the atmosphere to avoid dangerous climate change.
Alkaline materials are produced in numerous industries (cement, by-product slag from steel manufacturing, and red mud from aluminium production). These materials readily react with CO₂ to form carbonate minerals, representing stable long-term storage. However, the potential of these materials to prevent climate change has been considered relatively minor because i) they are produced from emission intensive processes, ii) their carbonation potential can typically displace only a small proportion of these emissions, iii) fully exploiting the theoretical potential of current annual production may result in, at best, a total removal of <1 GtCO₂ per year. Here I will present new modelling results which suggests that with increases in future material demand to meet a growing and developing global population, the carbon dioxide sequestration potential of alkaline materials may be several GtCO₂ per year by 2100. However, to be able to exploit this we will need new research on how these materials react with CO₂, we are only scratching the surface on the geochemical behaviour of these materials.”
Find out more here and register here.