CO2 Graveyard Off New York

Photo courtesy NASA

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Underground burial of globe-warming CO2 is of more interest than ever following Copenhagen’s do-nothing outcome. And buried volcanic rocks along the heavily populated coasts of New York, New Jersey, New England, and points further south may prove the best reservoirs found so far in the US.

Sequestration is one of those scary gambles we may be led to by default in the absence of real leadership reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The problem of course is that any burp into the atmosphere of buried CO2  would prove enormously instantly lethal to people in the area. As happened naturally in Africa.

To be practicable, sequestration needs to happen near dense population centers and industrial emissions sites. Kind of a reverse NIMBY. More like, Only In My Back Yard.

Which means the eastern seaboard, for starters.

Prior east coast sequestration research focused on inland sites: shale under New York and sandstone under New Jersey. But a new study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests basalt has significant advantages, and offshore basalt has even more advantages. Notably large areas off New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Georgia, and South Carolina. Plus a small area under Sandy Hook Basin, opposite New York Harbor.

This is because CO2 injected into basalt undergoes natural chemical reactions that eventually transform it into a solid mineral like limestone. Plus basalts at sea are covered not only by water but by hundreds or even thousands of feet of sediment. CO2 pressurized into liquid would have to be placed at least 2,500 feet deep for natural pressure to keep it from reverting to a gas and potentially leaking back to the surface. And the sediments on top would form impermeable caps. In theory.

So if the process works on a large scale, the danger of leaks could be reduced. The scientists from Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory estimate the small Sandy Hook basin alone may be capable of containing close to a billion tons of CO2… the equivalent of 40-years worth of emissions from four 1-billion-watt coal-fired plants. The largest mass extends from inland to offshore of Georgia and South Carolina.

Sure hope these basalts prove graveyards only for CO2.
 

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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