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  1. ConsistentMajor3011 on

    Revitalise Birmingham or Leeds? Nah, let’s do some science bullshit that’s proven not to work

  2. HotelPuzzleheaded654 on

    Or focus on developing renewable sources and infrastructure to the point they can be used to balance the grid thus limiting the need for carbon capture in the first place.

  3. Carbon capture? Also known as trees and foliage?

    This is a meme to continue supporting polluting fossil fuel industries.

    Is it too much to ask for politicians to devise real, grown up strategies and policies to handle the climate emergency?

  4. Haemophilia_Type_A on

    This is your daily reminder that studies have consistently shown carbon capture is a bunk technology that doesn’t work. It either contributes nothing to reduced emissions or leads to higher net emissions in the long run.

    The only reason the government is wasting so much money in it (rather than investing in actually efficacious tech) is because fossil fuel capital lobbies for it because it means they wont have to reduce their emissions as much-even though they surely also know it simply doesn’t work.

    I’d encourage you to look it up yourself if you don’t believe me.

    Abysmal government being abysmal as always. They’re captured by capital and are willing to contribute to ecological catastrophe if it means they get some attention from donors, invitations to fancy dinners, better media coverage from the Murdochs, etc.

  5. A million pounds per job.

    Excellent value.

    Why not build some much needed proper mass transit in the north?

  6. This is the modern day equivalent of making jobs by employing one set of people to dig holes and another set to fill them in

    Any energy spent capturing carbon would be better off not being generated in the first place or used on something productive

  7. This is just a way for energy companies to get public funds to continue business as usual but the public pay for the clean up or to make it cleaner and greener. I guess they haven’t made enough billions this month and need handouts again.

  8. commonsense-innit on

    cant teach old dogs new tricks

    times are a changing, not all business can profit from raw sewage

  9. Weird-Statistician on

    The equivalent of supplying buckets to the Titanic. Unless we are developing some amazing tech that we can sell to the rest of the world then this is a waste of money.

  10. As someone who works in the renewables industry this is incredibly stupid and disappointing.

    It is such a shit technology. Just give it up already.

  11. Best solution just use it to fill part of the finance black hole instead of more cuts.

  12. Vindaloovians on

    Carbon capture can be beneficial if employed properly. Plants capturing diffuse emissions (those already present in the atmosphere) are horrifically inefficient and have [marginal benefit](https://www.bgs.ac.uk/discovering-geology/climate-change/carbon-capture-and-storage/), but capturing emissions at source could be beneficial. This funding is primarily focussed on the latter.

    This is especially important for industries which can’t be easily decarbonised, namely those which don’t rely on fossil fuels just for energy generation, but also emit it as a byproduct of processing – for instance concrete and steel.

    Steel and other industries could also be decarbonised using hydrogen (in this case to replace coke coal in smelting), but current electrolysis routes are [fairly inefficient](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590123023005534). Currently it’s cheaper to produce hydrogen from natural gas, which results in CO2 emissions.

    It’s not a cut and dry issue of greenwashing. Even if we decarbonise energy and transport overnight, we’re still going to be producing CO2 emissions from other sources.

  13. sillysimon92 on

    £1million per job doesn’t sound like a huge investment on the tax payers end.
    This has the stink of when venture capitalism mixes with government overspend because they “legally have too”

  14. SpicyAfrican on

    Interesting that most of the comments are “£1m per job”, “plant some trees” or “we should build trains in the north instead”. Are redditors just repeating other redditors or are these talking points being encouraged elsewhere?

  15. Demostravius4 on

    Good! This sort of research is in dire need of funding. In the likely event the globe doesn’t get off it’s arse and curb emissions, the only real option will be carbon capture. We can’t force people to go green, we can work on a backup.

  16. SantaChoseViolence on

    Send less rich tourists to space, here I solved it, you dont need 2000 people for that, now where is my £2bn

  17. The article, as is often the case, is woefully lacking in relevant information. However, from what I recall of the original wider announcement I remain quite sceptical of the whole thing.

    Decarbonisation is vital, but CCS typically works with fossil fuel plants and other high emitting industries. The technologies already exist, but industry refuses to use them. So unless this is accompanied by a law change mandating that the industries use CCS it is challenging to see what effect this may have. I should also note that we are phasing out fossil fuel power anyhow, so there’s even more limited impact.

    Carbon removal research would have a much better return on investment.

  18. Why? This country is far too focused on being carbon neutral to our own economic detriment. We seem determined as a country to do everything we can to make things as difficult as possible for ourselves.

  19. Interesting_Try8375 on

    How does carbon capture even work?

    Bury charcoal would also put carbon back into the ground, so I hope it’s more effective than that