A ‘covalent organic framework’ can be used to capture carbon to store it or convert it for industrial use

Just half a pound of the stuff may remove as much carbon dioxide as a tree can, according to early tests. Once the carbon is absorbed by the powder, it can be released into safe storage or be used in industrial processes, like carbonizing drinks.

“This really addresses a major problem in the tech field, and it gives an opportunity now for us to scale it up and start using it,” says Omar Yaghi, a chemist at the University of California, Berkeley. It’s not the first material to absorb carbon, but “it’s a quantum leap ahead [of other compounds] in terms of the durability of the material”.

    • haverholm@kbin.earth
      6·
      28 days ago

      No no, the tiniest possible leap (practically equivalent to tiniest possible step except much more elaborate and important sounding)

      • jaybone@lemmy.world
        2·
        28 days ago

        There was an old tv show called quantum leap where the main character jumped through time. I assume this is what they are referring to, though no one under 45 years old will have heard of this tv show.

        • haverholm@kbin.earth
          3·
          28 days ago

          I’m old enough to remember the show 👴 but the reference is (also) that people frequently use “quantum” to mean something large and impressive, like in this headline, when originally it means a shift in quantum states at a molecular or atomic level — i.e., teeny tiny and hardly noticeable.

  • PumpkinSkink@lemmy.world
    8·
    28 days ago

    Ok. So we have this covalent organic network material that absorbs carbon. I have four questions: Whats the synthetic route? what’s the cost per gram to make it?Where do you put the carbon dioxide after? What’s powering the heat to desorb the carbon? Since they published in nature and the paper isn’t on scihub atm I’m gonna guess: "expensive, fiddly, and difficult to scale, and actually we asked a grad student to make a kg of it a year ago and he’s still working at the 1g scale and failing ", “about 25,000$/g”, “We have one identical sentence in both the conclusion and abstract which says a few things we could do, but that we haven’t actually tested”, and “natural gas, if you’re lucky”.

  • Lumidaub@feddit.org
    4·
    28 days ago

    So what exactly does one do with it? How is it applied? The article says it could be used to carbonate drinks after absorbing enough carbon but also to build plants that produce carbon - I don’t think they’re going to use pieces of a wall to carbonate drinks.