Anti-GMO Activists Slow Scientists Breeding a CO2-Reducing Superplant (thebulletin.org) 211
The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists calls it "a plant that could save civilization, if we let it." Slashdot reader meckdevil writes:
A "super chickpea plant" now in development could remove huge amounts of excess atmospheric carbon dioxide and fix it in the soil, greatly diminishing the impacts of climate change (not to mention producing large amounts of tasty hummus). But fear of anti-GMO activists has so far deterred her from using the CRISPR gene-editing tool to speed work on the plant.
The effort is led by Joanne Chory, director of the Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology laboratory at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences -- who according to the article will make much slower progress without CRISPR. "Even with advanced breeding techniques, Chory estimates that developing a super plant in this fashion would take around 10 years..."
"She estimates that if 5 percent of the world's cropland, approximately the total area of Egypt, were devoted to such super plants, they could capture about 50 percent of current global carbon dioxide emissions."
The effort is led by Joanne Chory, director of the Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology laboratory at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences -- who according to the article will make much slower progress without CRISPR. "Even with advanced breeding techniques, Chory estimates that developing a super plant in this fashion would take around 10 years..."
"She estimates that if 5 percent of the world's cropland, approximately the total area of Egypt, were devoted to such super plants, they could capture about 50 percent of current global carbon dioxide emissions."
The activists ate my homework! (Score:2, Informative)
Sorry, but activists like this don't give a fuck what method you're using. They just hate GMO full stop. The idea that activists are stopping you creating this magical solution to climate change because they're focused on use of CRISPR reeks of bullshit.
It's probably the worst excuse I've ever heard for over-promising, and under-delivering.
Re:The activists ate my homework! (Score:5, Funny)
The idea that activists are stopping you creating this magical solution to climate change because they're focused on use of CRISPR reeks of bullshit.
indeed. It isn't clear from TFA if the scientist is an idiot, the journalist is an idiot, or perhaps both. The Salk Institute is in La Jolla, California. La Jolla is the world's biggest center for biotech research. It is about the last place on earth where "GMO activists" are going to hinder research. TFA gave zero examples of any actual interference. GMO activists are toothless in America. They can't even pass ballot initiatives for labelling laws. It's over. Science won, scare-mongering lost.
I think the real reason her research hasn't yet saved the world is that capturing CO2 by "growing plants" isn't particularly innovative.
Re: The activists ate my homework! (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the activists haven't lost: Their fear campaign has already caused a lot of damage, and continues to do so. It's hard to sell produce that doesn't bruise (which reduces huge amounts of waste, including waste of what is needed to grow the plant, such as water) because anti-GMO activists have convinced the masses that it causes cancer or that it will make your dick fly off. This even applies to GMO tech that aims to eliminate the chance of acrylamide (a strong carcinogen) from showing up in cooked plant matter (including coffee.) Somebody has already created a potato with this gene, but they're not going to sell it because the mere fact that it is advertised as such also advertises that it is GMO, and for that reason alone, many will not buy it, hence it is not marketable. Furthermore, entire countries have banned it entirely based on anti-GMO bullshit, in fact it's even banned in most of Europe, which activists use as yet another talking point to try to validate their bullshit. Some cities in California forbid it as well, but California already proved that it was anti-science last week, so that isn't any surprise.
https://gmo.geneticliteracypro... [geneticlit...roject.org]
The best thing you, or anybody else can do, is to actively debunk these shitheads (start by pointing out that every bit of research papers against GMO is either false, outright scientific fraud (this is the most common ), or misleading. Also, Greenpeace does by far the most damage. They spend HUGE amounts of money on an ongoing FUD campaign, and believe me, their war chest is quite big. I'd lobby your Congress critters to revoke their tax exempt status, especially given their more about politics than anything else, and they certainly don't give a shit about science (this is the same reason many other countries have revoked their tax exempt status. People have proven them wrong so many times on this, and every time this happens, they just shift their argument. GMO is a huge opportunity to preserve the environment, and when this is shown to them, they still want it banned. Doesn't sound much like an environmentalist organization to me, rather it sounds more like Scientology, who also claim to be environmentalists.
Luddites! (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't those activists have faith that scientists can accurately predict all possible interactions in the real world from their models for decades ahead? Do they not understand that using the geometric progression to propagate extremely unlikely changes in genetic material is not a cause for concern because the models are so good they do not allow any room for errors?
Btw you do not work in biotech, do you? I would like to think that you advocate more GMOs for purely ethical reasons and not because you stand
Re:Luddites! (Score:4, Insightful)
Your objections apply equally to normal selective breeding, or even to any change to anything. The future can't be predicted with perfect accuracy, but that is not a good argument for doing nothing.
We have no evidence that GMO is harmful, and no plausible mechanism why it should be.
Re:Luddites! (Score:4, Informative)
You may have missed the part of the "extremely unlikely changes" propagating geometrically. Any sort of breeding creates changes that are statistically not that far from natural selection processes in terms of probability. Typical GMO changes are statistically incredibly unlikely to happen during the dominant statistical processes we call "natural" and for which has the process of evolution adjusted. That makes the process more unpredictable, and justified in doing only in extreme situations.
Kind of like giving highly experimental drugs to very sick patients without prospect of recovery otherwise is justified, while giving Ritalin to overactive kids -- or, for a darker shade of dark, giving thalidomide to mothers experiencing typical labor pains -- isn't.
The status of ArmoredDragon financial or other potential gains from GMOs is also very important to judge the value of the information in his post, I think you will agree.
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You may have missed the part of the "extremely unlikely changes" propagating geometrically.
I didn't miss it. I included it under "no plausible mechanism". How is GMO corn going to "propagate geometrically"? Corn (maize) is so far from the original wild plant that it is unable to propagate at all without human intervention.
for a darker shade of dark, giving thalidomide to mothers experiencing typical labor pains
Thalidomide was used to treat nausea (morning sickness), not labor pains.
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I was referring to GMOs in general -- unless a plant (or an animal?) has that "terminator" gene, it has the potential for spreading by natural means which cannot be tightly controlled except in a lab. All of us living species propagate geometrically, do we not? For each one of us there is one + x on the average in the next generation. X changes over time, but usually goes down from up after overpopulation and exhaustion of resources. That is my understanding.
"Plausible mechanism" implies a solid, robust mod
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At another level I'm not sure how much good this discussion does us, since we are using pure reasoning. At least I am, I don't have any experience in the field with GMOs and not much at all with regular crops. Pure reasoning and logic always breaks at some level when new details emerge.
What's more, I imagine if a pro-GMO person met several biotechnologists in a social setting and got an impression they were all sleazeballs, he'd probably change his stance even though no new information with respect to his l
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You're first paragraph not only fails to parse but makes absolutely no sense in rushing to its absurd conclusion. Sure, GMO implements changes that may otherwise be "statistically incredibly unlikely to happen", but that in no way "makes the process more unpredictable" nor does it suggest that it is justifiable "only in extreme situations". In fact, it suggests the opposite.
The rest of your post is not nearly that good.
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The status of ArmoredDragon financial or other potential gains from GMOs is also very important to judge the value of the information in his post, I think you will agree.
Of which I have none, by the way. I do not have any investments in anything agricultural (I mostly hold funds in technology, medicine, bonds, and international mid-cap.)
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We have no evidence that GMO is harmful, and no plausible mechanism why it should be. ... hm, probably it was 1910 already.
You mean: not more harmful than "normal breeding". Correct.
However you can manufacture stuff with genetical modifications that you can not breed.
That is hard to "test". And yes, we have "evidence that GMO is harmful", we know that since the 1930s, where GMO was not even invented. Was a german PhD work, by a woman
Why don't you put this into google: "horizontal gene transfer in plants"
Wow
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Seems you don't know what GMO means, so I write it out for your: genetically modified organism.
That means you put an artificial gene into an organism or you copy/paste a gene from a different organism into your subject. That can't be done with "breeding".
Go read a book about it.
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Then on the other, you have a 100% probability of continuing massive food waste contributing to hunger, disease, inefficiency, higher costs...
And you want to make the argument that the latter is preferable? Ok.
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Not necessarily cancer increase but primarily the probability -- not at all tiny -- of disrupting the system in an unpredictable ways, when the goal can be achieved by other means. Would you use a hypothetical new experimental drug that is a substitute for exercise in that it say, reduces some cardiovascular problems, when you can go out and exercise? (Assuming you can, if you are not bed bound for example.) You wouldn't, because three years of trials don't show what side effects can happen in ten or twenty
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Btw you do not work in biotech, do you? I would like to think that you advocate more GMOs for purely ethical reasons and not because you stand to gain from GMOs in any way.
I do not. Though I'm a network engineer working for a health care company (mostly servicing the providers (i.e. doctors) needs,) and it has nothing to do with agriculture. I did once have stock in a biotech company (which wasn't doing anything with agriculture, rather they were focused on four types of cancer,) but it was a penny stock that I only held briefly. I have a medical technology fund long-term, but it's not biotech. I've never held any funds that have anything to do with agriculture in any way.
If
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I guess there are different types of anti GMO people :D ...
I'm only against GMO'ed food. And GMO'ed plants in the wild that are sterile.
I don't care about GMO bacteria that produce medicine or vitamins, why would I?
And: we want it labeled. Hence we have laws according to it in Europe
And reading your rant: you obviously never ever really bothered to read anything about the topic, shithead Oh, Europe ... you hate us so much? Sorry, we don't like America, and its world politics, but we like americans, the peo
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"Sterile" plants come in two ways:
a) the seeds they make can not be planted, that is true for most GMO grains.
b) they have pollen that cause other plants, non GMO, to ripe fruits that are steril
There are thousands, probably close to a million of studies that show that GMO food can be dangerous.
You never even checked for a study, stupid idiot.
Big difference in farming though since GMO crops can lead to less use of pesticides
No, they lead to use of more pesticides, you moron. Most of GMO "food" is designed to
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I guess there are different types of anti GMO people :D
I'm only against GMO'ed food.
For what purpose? Because honestly, there is no rational reason to be opposed to it. Here's what GMO food can (and already does in many cases) do for us:
- Reduced need for landmass for farming. Increased need for agricultural landmass is the #1 reason this planet is losing forest areas.
- Reduced agricultural waste.
- Reduced need for insecticides.
- Reduced need for resources for farming, especially water.
- Increased nutritional value of food while reducing the toxicity. And yes, there is plenty of that in fo
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Like anything else, the problem isn't the technology. This isn't a "science" issue or about how willing you are to fellate scientists. This is about corporations that would happily grind you into crackers if they thought they could make money off of it and get away with it.
This is about who you trust:
Do you trust a monk?
Do you trust a college professor?
Do you trust the CEO of Monsanto?
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Sorry, but this is utterly wrong. The reason the non-bruising produce is a problem is simple: it tastes terrible.
Ya think? Really? And what do you think happens to the produce when it tastes terrible? Go ahead, take some guesses.
Dumbass.
The best thing you can do is recognize the reality, and stop freaking out over "imaginary" enemies, or pretending Greenpeace, with a budget in the millions, is somehow capable of defeating ADM, McDonalds, Monsanto, and others with actual HUGE amounts of money to lobby the actual Congress critters, who granted, don't give a shit about science,
And therein lies the problem: Them, and the general populace, are less likely to trust those companies over greenpeace. Just like you, them, and greenpeace, don't give a shit about science. That, and you proved at the start of your post that you're fucking stupid.
Re: The activists ate my homework! (Score:4, Insightful)
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There is a chemical additive in American bread that's banned in Europe. This might be your culprit.
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There's a problem then. Germany import's about half of it's wheat either from Canada or the US, Canada and the US use the same breeds of wheat because we have a vastly different growing environment. Most of that imported wheat is cheaper and in turn used in cheaper products(like those pretzels). It's not the wheat, it's how the wheat is being prepared for the product and either the preservatives, or the method used in fast-rising.
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These aren't the only possibilities, they aren't necessarily simpler, and an answer to that question isn't needed for the observation to be valid.
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Either way, it has nothing to do with GMOs, since there isn't any GMO wheat on the market anywhere in the world. There are so many warnings of either a bullshit story or a crazy person here: self-diagnosed "gluten sensitivity", blaming GMOs when there aren't any GMOs present to blame, claims of things being OK in one geographic location but not in another, and not least of all posting as AC. Next let's just roll out stories of how our kids had their brains melted by non-existent mercury in vaccines.
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Different varieties of wheat have differing amounts of gluten but you're right, they're not GMO. The preservatives they use in bread products also differ.
Re: The activists ate my homework! (Score:5, Informative)
Then next day, she ates bread. Boom. Major cramps that night.
Except that there is no "GMO wheat" sold anywhere in the world.
I hear more and more people like that.
You should learn how to use a search engine and work on your critical thinking skills. Before you claim that "X causes Y", you should make sure that X exists.
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Search engine ... nice idea.
First hit on google: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: The activists ate my homework! (Score:4, Informative)
Are you suggesting he was eating test bread he got from the researchers?
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Found the guy who things an apocryphal story is "science".
And doesn't seem to know that pasta is made of the same stuff bread is. Yeah, I know different kinds of pastas and breads, but if not stated otherwise, it means plain old wheat for both.
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You have a serious reading comprehension problem.
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You are right, because I missed all of his links to actual science as opposed to a story.
Re:The activists ate my homework! (Score:5, Funny)
The idea that activists are stopping you creating this magical solution to climate change because they're focused on use of CRISPR reeks of bullshit.
What sort of idiot wouldn't want CRISPR lettuce?
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over-promising, and under-delivering
Hey there, don't bring google into this
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First of all, the scientist in the article (RTFA, please) is planning on using cross-breeding to attain the desired plant to avoid GMO activists. That is not a GMO technology. It is taking different existing, non-GMO chickpeas and breeding them with each other to make new ones. It is genetic change in the plants, but is of a type GMO activists approve of.
But with cross-breeding it may take decades or never succeed. The scientist does not control the genetic outcome with cross-breeding. Detailed systematic s
Fear (Score:2)
Fear of the unknown.
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God and Nature, by giving them brains and hands to use.
What happens to the carbon? (Score:4, Interesting)
In true slashdot fashion, I comment before reading the article.
If the carbon gets fixed into the soil, how does that change the soil chemistry? It is something that can be done for a couple of years, and then the soil is saturated and can't support life any more? Does it deep down with the water and poison the ground water? I hope that it would be something that could be useful, and not an egypt-sized carbon landfill.
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If the carbon gets fixed into the soil, how does that change the soil chemistry?
You plant something along with it that uses a lot of carbon from the soil, if it becomes a problem. But there's normally carbon in soil.
Re:What happens to the carbon? (Score:4, Informative)
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Plants don't use carbon from the soil. They use CO2 from the air.
The whole point of this is to remove CO2 from the air and store it in the soil.
"All plants produce suberin, a waxy, water-repellent, carbon-rich compound, also known as cork, that protects roots and resists decay. Coastal grasses make a lot of it to keep water out of their roots. It is one of the most stable substances around, persisting in soil for hundreds, possibly thousands of years. One of Chory’s goals is to develop perennial plant
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Plants don't use carbon from the soil. They use CO2 from the air.
Some plants do both. They are still made mostly out of atmospheric carbon, of course. Corn is a particularly heavy soil carbon user.
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Can't find any source that states corn takes carbon from the soil. N, P, K, Ca, Mg only.
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It may be that all the carbon depletion is from overuse of nitrogen fertilizer... but it seems to be ubiquitous anywhere corn is grown.
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Plants don't get carbon from the ground. They get it from CO2... from the air... photosynthesis... the basis of all life.
Plants need nitrogen to make protein... also other trace minerals... not carbon.
Carbon in the ground is irrelevant.
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Well,
what could be the way/chemistry how a plant can suck carbon out of soil?
Any idea?
Re:What happens to the carbon? (Score:5, Informative)
Next time read TFA:
All plants produce suberin, a waxy, water-repellent, carbon-rich compound, also known as cork, that protects roots and resists decay. Coastal grasses make a lot of it to keep water out of their roots. It is one of the most stable substances around, persisting in soil for hundreds, possibly thousands of years. One of Chory’s goals is to develop perennial plants that make more suberin than existing varieties.
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That was my thought too. The stuff the plants product, suberin, was described as a "waxy, carbon rich" substance. TFA says it typically doesn't break down for centuries to millennia (although that seems unlikely to me--surely some microbe likes to eat this stuff).
So you plan a ton of super garbanzos and have a hummispalooza. A few decades later, I'm wondering about your soil quality. It will start getting gummed up with suberin, won't it? Will it still be good crop soil? I'm hoping the professor has thought
Science is part of nature... (Score:3, Insightful)
Think of all the worst things we've imagined about science.
Nature has done all those most horrible things on a scale millions of times larger already.
Nature kills millions of people with radiation each year.
Nature makes self-replicating killing machines each day.
Nature has groups killing sub-groups within a species for random non-reasons, leading to extinctions in each era of life.
All the worst-case scenarios science is accused of slippery-sloping down have happened with nature, and WILL happen with nature over time.
Science lets us pick and choose the parts of nature we want to see more of. Yeah - we're still stumbling on nasty notes as part of that remix - but the sound of science so far has been amazingly good so far overall.
I'd completely understand if what they were protesting is corporate manipulation of science - that's worthy of protest and debate. But protesting the science itself? As in, our foundational shared understanding of nature? Might as well protest language.
Ryan Fenton
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The squeaky wheel (Score:2, Troll)
It sure seems like with everything that matters, the squeaky wheel gets the oil.
Why does anyone who makes decisions actually care what the fringe fuck-balls are screaming? In reality, the people who are screaming about things like this, or transgender people needed bathrooms, or chem trails, or peoples right to make up their own sexes aside from the scientific fact that only two exist are a tiny fraction of the voting public.
It's like these fat people making a stink that clothing companies are fat shaming"
Nature edits genes every day (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess it is just due to ignorance about science that most people don't understand that GM, CRISPR, etc. just mimic the same processes that nature does trillions of times a day. Lots of mutations and viruses take genes from one species and insert them into others. Nature does this in a random manner, not targeted like scientists but the method is the same.
I think some people fear some mad scientist creating a super-organism which will take over. That's hard to do. Nature does routinely create more hardy organisms through the same mechanism and humans have created a few hardy organisms.
The most dangerous are superbugs created in industrial animal farms by bathing animals in antibiotics. No GM required. Nature just does its thing.
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TFA makes it sound like she is trolling. She hasn't actually had any opposition, she just claims that she could make this amazing breakthrough but is worried someone might object in some way.
TFA cites opposition to GM foods, but she isn't making food plants.
She is claiming that the mere potential for someone to object is stopping her, which is silly to say the least.
Not quite true (Score:2)
Re: Not quite true (Score:2)
Phages inject cross kingdom DNA trillions of times a day.
So I skimmed the article... (Score:2)
- As far as I can tell, the reason this plant breeder isn’t using CRISPR is because she is “concerned” anti-GMO activists will fight it. There’s no mention of anything these activists have actually done - so the premise itself seems a bit dicey. It’s like me saying “I don’t want to go outside for a walk because I read about people getting proselytized when they were out for a walk”.
- The approach itself doesn’t seem to address the fundamental problem of
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Yes, we can plant some farmland with this theoretical super crop... but the amount of land available for this has an upper bound, so the quantity of CO2 that can theoretically be fixed also has an upper bound. We’re basically talking about, at best, moving the clock back by some set number of years.
From TFA, they propose dedicating 5% of cropland to this plant and that removes 50% of the carbon dioxide we release (which seems like a remarkably high efficiency, high enough that I'm sceptical). That means, dedicate 10% and we would be in a carbon balance. Dedicate 15% and we start reducing atmospheric carbon dioxide. This, of course, depends on keeping our global carbon dioxide emissions constant, which may or may not be likely.
That would be expensive to do and would take a lot of arm-twisting. But the
Human success rate (Score:2)
History is fiiled with times that humans have attempted to improve on nature, usually by introducing some living thing into an ecosystem where it wasn't before.
Its almost impossible to find even one example where the result has actually been successful and not actually caused far more of a problem, especially to the other parts of the totally unprepared ecosystem.
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History is fiiled with times that humans have attempted to improve on nature
Most often when they interfere with Darwin to save the life of someone who might better have been removed from the gene pool. Obama-care, I'm looking at you.
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I couldn't agree more.
The "No cost is to great to save any/every human life" mentality is definitely leading to the end of all natural selection in humans and the inevitable consequence of a real devolution problem.
Re: Human success rate (Score:2)
myxomatosis release in Australia has been extremely successful at rabbit control.
This process has been used again an again with national release of a calcivirus strain last year
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Sure, there are no examples as long as we don't county a single plant variety of domesticated animal as an improvement. Have you seen how wild corn, wild wheat, or any wild fruit used to be like before human's major breeding efforts? Without Mayan corn breeding, they'd not have had a civilization at all.
I guess you also wish we did not have dogs, which have been bred for thousands of years to work with humans, as opposed to pack predators. Taming horses and cows? Oxes? All terrible things.
We have also done
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scourge of Tofu to spread from San Francisco to New York(l) :D
Tofu is fine if you use it how it is intended to be used (and it si a good Tofu, not an industrial packed white thing that tastes like nothing)
However: using it as Ersatz-Cheese or Ersatz-Sousage is not the way how you eat Tofu.
Unfortunately it is hard to find a recipe on the internet where Tofu is not a western degraded variation
Objections to GMOs (Score:2)
My objections to GMOs have less to do with the GMOs and more to do with the legal and social issues. Patents are largely the problem and it is enhanced by the abuse of the legal system. Monstersanto has created this negative climate by going after farmers and even people who aren't using their seeds.
There is another issue at stake here and that is that when organizations use public funds to develop products they should NOT get a patent. Instead it should be published and go into the public domain as a requi
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You get payed by Monsanto?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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It's clear you didn't read your own link -- it repeats exactly what I said:
Monsanto has stated it will not "exercise its patent rights where trace amounts of our patented seed or traits are present in farmer's fields as a result of inadvertent means."[15] The Federal Circuit found that this assurance is binding on Monsanto, so that farmers who do not harvest more than a trace amount of Monsanto's patented crops "lack an essential element of standing" to challenge Monsanto's patents.[16]
The usual claim involves patent infringement due to intentionally replanting patented seed.
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Over how many iterations? Perhaps after one year there will be a single-digit prevalence of patented seeds, but, assuming drift from the neighbour's farm occurs every year, what will this prevalence be after (say) ten years?
In the real world, probably not any higher. Your question presumes the farmer is saving seeds (and, indeed, saving a well-mixed subset of the entire harvest, which is a whole discussion in its own right) every single year, and replanting them the next year. There are a number of reasons why this doesn't actually happen much [thefarmers...terusa.com].
On an even more pragmatic level, I'll again gently point out that nobody has been able to present a single story where there was any actual evidence that a situation played out like th
Sadly ironic (Score:2)
The sad part of this is, a lot of these "anti-GMO" types claim they're protecting the environment. Yet they oppose a technology that could cause agriculture to require less land, less pesticide and herbicide, less fertilizer, and less water. Now they're even fighting against plants that would dramatically reduce CO2.
It reminds me a lot of the "anti-nuclear" activists who claim they're environmentalists. You don't get to call yourself that and then oppose technologies that would actually help. Some of these
thats what SJWs do best (Score:2)
i hope they get to make this super-chick pea plabt in to a big success
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Did your friends at Fox tell you that GMO and social justice were related?
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If it works, it will need many decades anyhow. (Score:2)
I'm not sure what the problem is. Sure, if they have to spend 10 years on the project when they could otherwise spend less, maybe it's relevant, but ... it's not like with CRISPR they'd have solved CO2 tomorrow. If they could LITERALLY flip a switch and have the end result tomorrow, they'd then have to test that it works, and then start figuring out how to grow the stuff, and how to harvest in a way which doesn't screw up the CO2 capture, etc, so to even get up to speed is going to take like 10 years, and
I love hummus (Score:2)
And I figure if I have kids with three eyes they'll be able to hit a 110mph fastball.
Just do it (Score:2)
protesters (Score:2)
"She estimates that if 5 percent of the world's cropland, approximately the total area of Egypt, were devoted to such super plants, they could capture about 50 percent of current global carbon dioxide emissions."
If this is accurate then anyone protesting this is insane.
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Considering that 90% of Egypt is a desert ...
Anyway: cropland is used to plant, crops. Covering 15% with that plant means: 15% less crops.
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Re:Won't work (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, I know the original poster was being foolish, but it is a little more complex than this also.
When plants die, some of their carbon can compost to soil, some of their carbon is released as methane, etc and some of it as CO2 if they get burnt.
So, the benefits are much more complex.
One interesting factor that is rarely talked about is the grasses actually absorb and compost large amounts of CO2, by some estimates more than common trees.
People get all 'green' about trees, and you ignore grass, most likely because trees are 'big' and 'nice' and grass is just too common?
Then they tend to want more treesplanted, however they also often plant nice pretty SLOW GROWING trees... which contribute very very little.
Could this 'super plant' contribute more? sure, DEPENDING ON HOW IT WAS USED. It is common to burn the straw left over from processing chickpeas..
That would reduce its contribution to very little.
The larger question is not about how it is created, how will suitable care be taken about evaluation if its actual environmental impact.
Re:Won't work (Score:5, Insightful)
Looks like this is long term:
All plants produce suberin, a waxy, water-repellent, carbon-rich compound, also known as cork, that protects roots and resists decay. Coastal grasses make a lot of it to keep water out of their roots. It is one of the most stable substances around, persisting in soil for hundreds, possibly thousands of years. One of Chory’s goals is to develop perennial plants that make more suberin than existing varieties.
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Unfortunately, if there's a increased amount of suberin in the soil, it's only a matter of time before some bacteria evolve to feed on it, and turn it all back to CO2.
Re: Won't work (Score:2)
Could happen but hasn't in millions of years.
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Interesting. I get flatulence from most beans but not from hummus (chickpeas). You must have different gut chemistry.
Flatulence is methane (CH4), not CO2. (But methane is a potent greenhouse gas.) That's why cows are so bad for the environment. They emit lots of methane (burps and farts).
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Flatulence is methane (CH4), not CO2.
Farts contain both. A typical fart is about 60 percent nitrogen, 20 percent hydrogen, 9 percent carbon dioxide, 7 percent methane, and 4 percent oxygen. All of these are odorless. Only about one percent of a fart is the smelly stuff: hydrogen sulfide gas and mercaptans.
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Methane gets destroyed relatively quickly.
More cows only mean a higher level, not an constantly increasing amount.
If you get "farts" from beans, the beans are prepared badly.
Usually you put them over night into a pot of water, pour out the water in the morning and put fresh water in, pour that out before cooking and you are fine. https://cooking.nytimes.com/gu... [nytimes.com] Ah, they call it "soaking" :D
Re: Super Flatulence (Score:2)
More cows lead to an increasing level of methane.
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Yes,
but the level is stable
So it is irrelevant in the big picture.
Basically every animal is farting ... so it is pointless to go after cows anyway.
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More cows, more methane, increasing level of methane (a potent greenhouse gas).
Cows (and other ruminants) are unique in that a lot of digestion (fermentation) takes place in their stomachs. This is where most methane production occurs. Cow burps are by far the greatest contribution to greenhouse gas. Much more than non-ruminant animals.
As the cows say... "Eat chicken"
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Unless the bastards are made of asbestos, I think there's a pretty simple countermeasure.
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The opinion column that you have linked to does not say what you claim it says.
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The first link [theguardian.com] says this...
Climate contrarians accidentally confirm the 97% global warming consensus A new paper by GWPF's Richard Tol accidentally confirms the results of last year's 97% global warming consensus study"
The second is paywalled
The third link [iop.org]...
Among abstracts expressing a position on AGW, 97.1% endorsed the consensus position that humans are causing global warming. In a second phase of this study, we invited authors to rate their own papers. Compared to abstract ratings, a smaller percentage of self-rated papers expressed no position on AGW (35.5%). Among self-rated papers expressing a position on AGW, 97.2% endorsed the consensus. For both abstract ratings and authors' self-ratings, the percentage of endorsements among papers expressing a position on AGW marginally increased over time. Our analysis indicates that the number of papers rejecting the consensus on AGW is a vanishingly small proportion of the published research.
etc etc
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Again, you stumbled upon a paper you thought would back your claims without reading it.
Now upon being shown it is in fact the opposite, and confirms the first result with another study. A study specifically designed to solve the problem you claimed in the first one. Whats the chance you now accept 2 independent studies that show 97% agree with manmand climate change? And that the agreement is increasing.
I can almost guarantee you will go with option 2. Pretend you never saw or just dismiss out of hand al
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Really I'm not going to worry about the upcoming Krynoid invasion at least until they manage to get one of those new-fangled ground-up-re-engineered photosynthetic cycles edited into a viable plant.
And probably not even then.