Future Of Green Materials “Green Carbon”

By: Jon Dougal – April 9, 2008

Many of us know that green building is about the reuse of materials made, at least partially, from elements in specific waste streams—redefining what is “waste.” Many states have very stiff waste reduction mandates, which create a pool of potential materials to recycle or even down-cycle—from rugs and carpet to used tires and construction debris.

Maybe someday in the not-too-distant future, we’ll have a mandated label to show what materials are mixed into a finished product to help facilitate its cradle-to-cradle manufacturing.

What if?
Could buildings become a repository for carbon dioxide? Current strategy for combating global heating is to try to take carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere, compress it and then inject into the subterranean strata or the ocean..…with of course unknown long term effects.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a major greenhouse gas that contributes to global (heating) warming. In 2005 there were 25 billion metric tons of CO2 released into the atmosphere.

CO2 comes naturally in nature primarily as a carbonate. Currently, you drink it in carbonated soft drinks, you eat it in your yogurt, and you polish your teeth with it as toothpaste. We make wall board out of it…and that is just one example of how buildings could become targets of the mineralization of CO2.

Current off the shelf technology uses CO2 for:

• The making of paper to help increase whiteness, gloss and printing quality.
• In various forms as a fertilizer for agricultural land and forestry.
• Acting as effective fillers in concrete to improve density, stability and durability.
• As the most important mineral in compounding plastic polymers.
• Can be used as an extender in paints and coatings.
• Can be used as a natural buffer and pollution filter.

Eliminating harmful CO2 from human created sources, such as power plants and industrial factories, will help reduce global warming. If manufactures of various building products were savvy to their ability to make or even augment their products with (extracted from the atmosphere) CO2, then we could have a market for a commodity that is as yet going unappreciated, much less devastating to our future generations.

As always, money rules. Low-cost Calcium Carbonates/Sulfates/Gypsm, that which is used in wall board, costs about $6/ton. CaCO3 used in yogurt and toothpaste costs $1000/ton. What lies in between cost-wise is connected to the extraction, transportation and combining process.

The Need for a Breakthrough Technology
Little known dirty secret is that the combustion of ethanol produces CO2, but the production of ethanol actually produces more CO2 than the burning of it. Can you imagine that a normal size ethanol plant produces 360,000 tons of CO2 in the production of about 30 million gallons of ethanol? Is this process “environmentally friendly?”

Another very good use of CO2 is as a growth agent in the production of algae to produce oil--oil that can be esterfied into bio-diesel. Currently the US government – the departments of Energy and Defense – will write a blank check for the delivery an algae production facility. The Defense Department looks at bio-diesel production from algae as a primary dependable source that can be installed anywhere in the world.

The rate at which algae grows is rather static, but can be increase dramatically by infusion of CO2 into the growing medium. Whether algae are used for bio-diesel production or for food, it is still an end use for CO2. How about if algae were grown as a fuel source as in burning? Harvested in the summer and dried into bricks, it could be used just like pellet stoves for heating in regions where no other heating sources exist. There are lakes and water ways clogged with the stuff all over the world. At least it would be carbon neutral, and the CO2 that produces it would be the same amount of CO2 that is produced from the burning.

Storing or sequestering carbon, as proposed by some large CO2 emitters, is not the solution. Why leave a ticking time bomb for future generations? It is far better to transform CO2 into useful products.

As a potential solution to global heating the extraction of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and its combining with various materials could be a form of biomimicry. Since carbonates occur most naturally in nature could manufacturers of building materials include the component of carbon dioxide in its various forms as a motivation to purchase or a marketing tool? To save the planet would the LOHAS demographic educate their kids on the need to buy products rich in CO2?

Could we then say in our potential analysis (LCA) of “recycled content” of products that this product has more sequestered carbon from the atmosphere than another one? A similar type of phrase as “printed on 100% recycled paper, using soy inks.” Will there be labels on products that state the amount of CO2 in the form of H2CO3 (responsible for the acidification of the oceans), or CACO3, or that a given quantity of CO2 was attached to the manufacturing process to produce this or/to that product?

Or further, that at the end of life disposal of this product, the CO2 can be combined with ???………. Just like we now use the embodied energy concept of produced materials in their life cycle assessment (LCA). One of the added benefits of recycling is the capture of the embodied energy in the product. Carpet manufacturers, aluminum can makers, glass bottle makers are now reaping the benefits of embodied energy in their use of recycled content as energy prices ascend.

A new company has now come online to facilitate the extraction and marketing of CO2 into building products. Carbon Sciences of Santa Barbara California has gathered some PhDs in chemistry and will be engaged in delivering CO2 in its various forms to industry. Enter “Green Carbon” former bad guy now in its transformed state a potential hero the solution of “Global Heating.”

Their “Green Carbon” process combines captured CO2 with readily available mineral feedstocks. Using patent-pending technology, mineral feed stocks are transformed into a highly stable and useful mineral carbonate product for industrial applications. In our everyday lives, we touch many products that either contain mineral carbonates or use mineral carbonates during production.

“GreenCarbon” from Carbon Sciences has these Advantages:

Stability Over the Long Term - The production of mineral carbonates insures a permanent fix rather than tempo­rary storage of the CO2, thereby ensuring no legacy issues for future generations;
Immense Capacity - Raw materials for binding CO2 exist in vast quantities across the globe in amounts that far exceed even the most optimistic estimates of coal reserves (~10,000 × 10 9 tons)
Economic Viability – The sale of value-added products created during the carbonation process has the potential to offset carbon sequestration costs.

If you’re an agency or potential major emitter of CO2, Carbon Sciences have a mobile laboratory that can demonstrate the potential uses of CO2. The Mobile Prototype demonstrates the GreenCarbon™ Technology for converting harmful CO2 into carbonate products for use in building materials, paper, plastics, fertilizers and other industrial applications.

Contact Derek McLeish at dm@carbonsciences.com, www.carbonsciences.com

By Jon Dougal, all rights reserved. Reproducing can be obtained by permission from the GreenInsight eZine, by contacting editor@greenmotion.org