Abstract
Ocean alkalinization is a climate stabilization technique that increases the buffer capacity of the ocean, thereby storing additional atmospheric CO2 in the form of dissolved inorganic carbon. Despite the pressing climate challenge, research on ocean alkalinization remains in an early stage. Here we want to investigate a new form of ocean alkalinization: coastal enhanced carbonate dissolution. The dissolution of carbonate minerals in coastal and shelf sediments provides an important source of alkalinity to the ocean. By deliberately introducing fast-weathering carbonate minerals into the coastal zone, one could create a CO2 sink. The geochemical basis is firmly established: enhanced carbonate dissolution forms a natural response of the marine carbon cycle towards elevated CO2. Furthermore, enhanced carbonate dissolution holds a principal advantage over other CO2 drawdown technologies as it also counteracts ocean acidification and it can be directly integrated into existing coastal management programs, like dredging and other marine engineering operations. So far, there has been no rigorous assessment of the CO2-sequestration efficiency of enhanced carbonate dissolution. Here, we will conduct a set of flowthrough reactor and mesocosm experiments to investigate enhanced carbonate weathering in coastal environments, develop novel modelling tools to assess the efficiency of CO2 removal under realistic natural settings and identify promising locations in the coastal ocean.
Researcher(s)
Research team(s)
Project type(s)