But did it bury any carbon? Previous studies suggested that most of it will end up back in the atmosphere.
We don't know that yet. I don't agree with you that most of it will end up back in the atmosphere. Look at the [Victor] Smetacek paper [this year in Nature]. A significant amount of carbon ended up on the seafloor. Diatoms [a type of shelled algae] are big carbon sinkers because of their stony shells and powered buoyancy. When they run out of power they sink.
Tell me about the 120 metric tons of iron you dumped.
We didn't choose the simplest form of iron and dump it in the ocean. We did a carefully thought through, planned process that asked, "What forms of iron does the ocean use today and historically? How might we determine what's the right form or composition or method of preparation or method of distribution of the forms of iron that we know are effective?" So we had an experimental matrix that we believe will answer that and we have the data now.
Mother Nature blows dust in the wind, which carries fully reduced iron oxides. That's the form of iron in dust in the wind. Upstart scientists, humans, say, "We can do better than Mother Nature. We won't use that natural source of iron that nature uses; we'll use commercial fertilizer. We'll use iron sulfate because iron sulfate has greater solubility and greater biological availability."
We tested both. Our data will tell us. Do you get a different plankton bloom if you exactly mimic Mother Nature than if you exactly mimic some supplier of agricultural chemicals?
Where did you get the iron?
It's an extremely commonly available material. Iron ore dust is in use everywhere. Australia sells 600 million tons of it to China [to make steel]. The amount of sweepings, the fugitive dust from the 600 million tons shipped from Australia to China is infinitely more than we used.
We're not at liberty to divulge precise details of suppliers and such. Anybody associated with this project is viciously attacked.
Why did you pick the location you did?
Where could you do a more perfect experiment than in between a normal, natural similar phenomenon and an enormous unnatural absence? The best experimental design is to go in between two natural controls, which is where our bloom was placed. That's why [the late marine biologist] John Martin picked west of the Galápagos, because those islands are a massive source of iron. Here's a massive iron stimulated bloom that goes off to the west of the Galápagos for hundreds of miles and here's the most iron-depleted ocean in the southeast Pacific.
The best place to do science on this and get knowledge is to put the bloom in between. See what natural iron-stimulated blooms produce and what the non-blooming ocean has. Test whether or not the characteristics of what you've created [are] different in any way to a natural system.
So what did you observe at sea?
Life appeared. The nightly migration of zooplankton from the thermocline [a layer of water in the ocean that marks the transition from warmer surface waters to colder deep waters] to the surface, we saw that. Copepods, salps, all the little fish. We have thousands and thousands of biological samples now going under microscopes around the world to be identified and quantified. We didn't have a ship with 58 scientists. We didn't have a lab on board, and it's not a great big ship with the stability to do microscopy on board. What we could do is work 24/7 and the Haida crew on the ship worked literally 24/7. Their job was to collect an unimaginably vast collection of samples.
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9 Comments
Add CommentThis man has committed ecologic terrorism with huge ramifications and he should be charged and prosecuted for ocean dumping.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe have time and time again found out what happened when we try and improve on nature, it goes horribly wrong!
Sometimes science progresses by taking risks. Jenner with the smallpox vaccine. The Manhattan Project (with some scientists betting the detonation would be hot enough to ignite the atmosphere and kill everything on the planet). You cannot do everything by simulation on a PC. There is no substitute for asking nature herself a question, and yes, sometimes that's a risky thing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm glad he is pushing forward with experiments. A few angry people should not block research into science that we might need in the future.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd, I'm pretty shocked at the one-sided coverage up until now. If you read other articles in the past week, none of them had any kind of balance and obviously didn't even try to present his side of the story.
That supports his claim that the press has twisted the issue.
I am more concerned w. all the other things that people are dumping into the ocean - not some rust dust.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCompared to all the drums of toxic waste dumped into the ocean over the years , this project is a drop in the bucket. 'Disposal' companies were paid to dispose of the waste and they've been simply dumping it into the ocean for decades.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSince apparently we can't stop burning carbon fuels, at least in time to prevent severe warming, it seems like Iron fertilization is the best option. Sure, plankton gets eaten and some CO2 is emitted, but until we get better data, I think more ocean life of any kind means more carbon-containing waste and corpses go to the ocean floor. Opposing this seems like supporting the human-created epocalypse.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this100 tonnes of Iron (III) Sulfate turns to be one helluva tectonic laxative!! 7.7 Magnitude Earthquake registered at on Queen Charlotte Fault on October 27, 2012. Sure there was an algal bloom in August, 2012 after the Iron Sulfate dumping from a fishing boat in July, 2012, but it turns out this Iron Sulfate stuff goes right to the fault cracks in the plates and is slippery like graphite in a rusty car door lock!! I think we've got Earth Grease!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPatent it!!
We as humans have arrogance to think we know how to make nature better and fix everything we have broken! Scientists paid by capitalists spend so much trying to see if the can, and no time thinking about whether they should!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRuss George is an enviromental hero and everyone should be kissing his butt. If PLANKTOS had been allowed to roll out large scale ocean fert 7 years ago when they were trying rather than being villanised as they were, we wouldn't be in quite as deep schtuck as we are today!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNOW we are within 2 years of complete loss of artic summer sea ice, this lost reflectivity doubling global warming from what greenhouse gases alone are doing.
NOW we have to furiously "geoengineer" with sulphate aerosols in the Arctic stratosphere and other SERIOUS geoengineering techniques WITHIN THE NEXT 5 YEARS if we wish to avoid the rapidly escalating release of several thousand gigatons of methane locked in and under the siberian continental shelf submarine permafrost which is melting furiously NOW. THAT scenario has global average temperatures up by some 10 deg c and the planet sterile of all higher life forms by 2050.
Doubt any of this?
-Check out the Arctic Methane Emergency Group (AMEG), and the Arctic News blogsite.
We need ocean fert. ocean biomass, animal or vegetable, dead on the sea floor or swimming...
-is carbon not in the atmosphere or acidifying the oceans!