The hidden carbon vault inside your tools

At any moment, crude oil is being pumped from deep within the planet. Some of that sludge is sent to a refinery and processed into plastic, which then becomes the phone in your hand, the shades on your window, and the ornaments strung on your Christmas tree.

Although scientists know how much carbon dioxide Emitted to make these products (The new iPhone is like driving Over 200 miles), there is little research on how much is hidden in them. A study published Friday in the journal Cell Reports Sustainability It is estimated that billions of tons of carbon from fossil fuels – coal, oil and gas – have been stored in tools, building materials and other long-lasting man-made items over the last 25-year period, tucked away in what researchers call “carbon.” “Technological field.”

According to the study conducted by researchers at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, 400 million tons of carbon are added to the technosphere stock every year, and growing at a slightly faster rate than fossil fuel emissions. But in many cases, the technological ocean does not permanently retain carbon; If things are disposed of and burned, it warms the atmosphere as well. In 2011, 9% of total fossil carbon extracted was buried in technological elements and infrastructure, an amount roughly equivalent to that year’s emissions from the European Union if burned.

“It’s like a time bomb,” said Klaus Hubacek, an environmental economist at the University of Groningen and senior author of the study. “We extract a lot of fossil resources from the Earth, put them in the technological ocean, and then leave them lying around. But what happens after the lifespan of the organism?

The word “technological field” began to appear 1960when a science writer named Will Lipkowski wrote that “modern man has become a lonely, aimless prisoner in his technological world,” in an article for the journal Science. Since then, the term “biosphere” has been used by ecologists and geologists to deal with the amount of stuff humanity has suffocated the planet with.

“The problem is that we were incredibly profligate when we were making and building things,” said Jan Zalasiewicz, a professor of paleobiology at the University of Leicester in the UK, who was not involved in the University of Groningen study.

In 2016, Zalasiewicz and his colleagues published a paper that estimated that the technosphere has grown to approximately 30 trillion tonsThis is a quantity 100,000 times greater than the mass of humans stacked on top of each other. The study also found that “technofossils” – unique types of objects made by humans – outnumber unique types of life on the planet. In 2020, a separate group of researchers found that the technological field It doubles in size approximately every 20 years It is now likely to surpass all living things.

“The question is, how does the technological ocean affect the biosphere?” For example, plastic bags and fishing nets can suffocate animals they encounter, Zalasiewicz said. Unlike natural ecosystems, such as forests and oceans that can absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, humans “are not good at recycling,” Zalasiewicz said. .

Managing the disposal of all these things in a more climate-friendly way is precisely the problem that researchers from the University of Groningen want to draw attention to. Their research looked at 8.4 billion tonnes of fossil carbon found in human-made objects that were in use for at least a year between 1995 and 2019. Nearly 30% of this carbon was trapped in rubber and plastic, most of it in household appliances. Another quarter was hidden in bitumen, a byproduct of crude oil used in construction.

“Once you get rid of these things, the question is, how do you process that carbon?” said Can Hediroglu, one of the study’s authors and a doctoral student in energy and environmental studies at the University of Groningen. “If you put it in incinerators and burn it, you immediately release more carbon emissions into the atmosphere, which is something we don’t really want to do.”

Research estimates that each year, approximately one-third of these fossil products are burned in technology. Another third ends up in landfills, which can serve as a kind of carbon sink in the long term. Unfortunately, the authors acknowledge that these sites often exist Leaked chemicalsburp Methaneor Dumping microplastics In the environment. Just under a third are recycled – a solution that comes into its own problems – A small amount is scattered.

“There are many different aspects to the problem and getting them right,” Hubacek said. However, he said landfills are a good starting point if they are managed well. According to the study, the bulk of fossil carbon that is placed in landfills decomposes slowly and remains in place for more than 50 years. Designing products in a way that they are recyclable and long-lasting can help keep carbon trapped longer.

Ultimately, Hubacek said, the real solution starts with people asking whether they really need so much stuff. “Reduce consumption and avoid making it in the first place. But once you have it, then we need to think about what to do next.”

This article originally appeared on grinding in https://grist.org/science/gadgets-carbon-sinks-technosphere-study/. Grist is an independent, non-profit media organization dedicated to telling stories of climate solutions and a just future. Learn more at grist.org.