Scientists have succeeded in turning CO2 into stone

An extremely promising method of CO2 removal is still being researched and developed.

Scientists have turned carbon dioxide into hard rock by introducing high-pressure CO2 solution into basalt. Natural chemical reactions will do the rest.

This technique takes two years of development to be achieved today, which gives scientists a way to collect and store new CO ₂ , the CO ₂ that people still release into the air through activity. industry. This technique has the potential to handle the large amount of CO2 in our atmosphere.

The study was carried out by the PNNL Pacific Northwest National Laboratory of the American Institute of Technology, based on a similar experiment conducted by Icelandic scientists earlier this year. They all achieved the same goal of turning CO ₂ into liquid, then putting it into basalt stone for storage.

In this study, scientists used pure CO ₂ and they achieved an impressive result, they obtained 1,000 tons of CO2 solution.

The team at PNNL knows that chemical reactions can take place in laboratory conditions, but until now, they have not yet been sure how long it will take for the reaction to occur in nature.

"We now know that this petrification process is very fast, which makes storing CO2 in these basalt structures much easier , " said researcher Pee McGrail. "We have identified a short period of time that CO2 has been permanently petrified."

In field research, scientists pumped CO2 solution into a stream of lava that had dried up at a depth of 900 meters underground, near Wallula, Washington state.

At that depth, minerals including calcium, iron and magnesium are the constituents of the basalt structure. These minerals will become unstable and gradually decay under the acidic effect of CO ₂ .

The disintegrated minerals will react and CO ₂ to form a material called ankerite, a substance that closely resembles limestone and can bind to basalt.

The end result is the white space on a basalt structure in the picture.

Turning CO ₂ into stone is not a new idea, what search scientists are a way to accelerate this. According to previous calculations, this chemical reaction can take thousands of years to complete.

Basalt is a material that can be found in many parts of the world, including North America and Iceland, which is also part of why this is an effective technique, an available weapon. to fight more and more CO ₂ .

The capture of carbon also has a high cost and besides, scientists are not sure how large this scale of experiment can be. Even today, the capacity of basalt has not been clarified by scientists.

Currently, more research is needed before we can claim that the problem of atmospheric CO ₂ will be completely solved. But it is no wonder that these studies open a wide door for an effective CO ₂ treatment.

Let's wait and see.