Rocks found in California and Oman, as well as other places, can capture carbon, as noted in this article from MIT’s Technology Review, and how cool is that!
An excerpt.
“Chemical reactions that pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and store it in the form of solid rock inside geological formations could offset billions of tons of carbon-dioxide emissions each year, according to researchers at Columbia University, in New York. The scientists say that research done on large rock formations in Oman suggests new ways to sequester carbon-dioxide emissions to help lessen global warming.
“The researchers have shown that rock formations called peridotite, which are found in Oman and several other places worldwide, including California and New Guinea, produce calcium carbonate and magnesium carbonate rock when they come into contact with carbon dioxide. The scientists found that such formations in Oman naturally sequester hundreds of thousands of tons of carbon dioxide a year. Based on those findings, the researchers, writing in the current early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, calculate that the carbon-sequestration rate in rock formations in Oman could be increased to billions of tons a year--more than the carbon emissions in the United States from coal-burning power plants, which come to 1.5 billion tons per year.”
