2004 LOM Workshop

Wednesday 4:40 - 5:00 p.m.

Simulation of oceanic carbon sequestration via iron fertilization or direct injection

Rainer Bleck
Los Alamos National Lab
bleck@lanl.gov

ABSTRACT

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As part of the international effort to retard climate change due to fossil fuel burning, the U.S. Dept. of Energy is exploring ways to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Among the technologies proposed to date are two that involve the ocean. One proposal is to inject either liquefied or solidified CO2 into the deep ocean. The second is to increase the air-sea CO2 flux by encouraging phytoplankton growth in regions where the latter is limited by lack of iron. The long-term effectiveness and environmental ramifications of the two approaches are being studied by numerical simulation. Time-averaged isopycnic mass fluxes extracted from two circulation models available in Los Alamos, HYCOM and POP, are being used to simulate the dispersion of liquefied CO2 in the world ocean on 100- to 1000-year time scales. A biogeochemistry model developed to simulate iron fertilization in an eddy-resolving version of POP is being ported to HYCOM to assess the likelihood (based on experiments conducted in parallel in both models) that large-scale, sustained iron fertilization will have a long-term net "drawdown" effect on atmospheric CO2. The project is in its initial phase; hence, only preliminary results will be shown.

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LOM Users' Workshop, February 9-11, 2004