107. Carbon Capture w/ Algae, Plants Grown in Lunar Soil, Developments for Wind Turbines

Summary: Brilliant Planet plans cheap, gigaton-scale carbon capture using algae | New Atlas (01:08) Direct air carbon capture is currently far too costly – but this London company, Brilliant Planet, says it can do it at enormous scale for a tenth the price, using engineered algal blooms in ponds located near desert coastlinesGoals to de-acidify the ocean as well. Direct air capture will need to be part of the decarbonizing equation, and it'll need to be massively scalable, energy efficient and much, much cheaper than today's technology. The idea is to corral and harness the carbon-gobbling power of algae, replicating and maintaining the conditions that cause algal blooms in large, low-density outdoor ponds full of seawater.Algae is an inherently more efficient biological machine for carbon capture than trees or plants Its entire surface area is dedicated to photosynthesis and it doesn't waste resources creating trunks, roots or branches Another bonus is that it grows and proliferates extremely fast under the right conditions. Simplified process: Account for most of the energy this system requires A location is chosen, on flat desert land near a coast,  A team of bio-prospectors starts filtering through samples of thousands of local strains of algae, selecting the ones that best fits the location.  Thus, there are no introduced species, and the algae is already well adapted to the local climate and conditions. They set up a series of pumps, with which to bring seawater into a series of containers and ponds.  In these right conditions they would monitor, they can grow a lot of algae. It also can deacidify the seawater. CEO Adam Taylorm said: “For every unit of water that passes through the system we de-acidify the equivalent of 5.1 units back to pre-industrial pH levels." Taylor says the company's already identified a "short list" of about half a million square kilometers of suitably flat coastal desert land. Potential for about two gigatons – two billion tons – of carbon capture In other words, it could cancel out more than 5.5 percent of humanity's annual global CO2 emissions, offsetting about half the total emissions of today's road transport sector.  The company has tested its approach successfully in Oman, South Africa. Now they plan on moving to a large area, roughly 74 acres, in 2023. Musk's Starlink Internet Is Now Available in 32 Countries | CNET (07:14) SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet service has now rolled out to 32 countries, the company said Thursday. The hardware can ship "immediately" to areas where the service is available. Starlink is available in much of the US, Europe and New Zealand, in addition to chunks of Canada, Australia and South America. Many of the remaining countries and areas show availability coming in 2023. After a few years of launches, the company has amassed a constellation of more than 2,000 low Earth orbit satellites to provide satellite internet around the globe.   Plants Have Been Grown in Lunar Soil For The First Time Ever | Good News Network (09:29) Food has been grown in soil collected from the moon for the first time, paving the way for human migration across the solar system.It is a first step towards producing food and oxygen on the moon, or during space missions. This all relates to NASA’s Artemis program which will lay the foundation for a sustained colony on the lunar surface.Using the moon to validate deep space systems and operations—before embarking on a manned voyage to Mars. Co-author Professor Rob Ferl, talked about the future missions and growing food in the lunar soil:“For future, longer space missions, we may use the moon as a hub or launching pad. It makes sense that we would want to use the soil that’s already there to grow plants … So, what happens when you grow plants in lunar soil, something that is totally outside of a plant’s evolutionary experience? What would plants do in a lunar greenhouse? Could we have lunar farmers?” This University of Flori