Technology Development and Future Directions of Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement

Abstract

Since the industrial revolution, nearly one-third of anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions have been absorbed by the ocean which has a huge potential for negative emissions. Ocean alkalinity enhancement is considered to be one of the most potential marine negative emission technologies. Olivine which is widely distributed over the world is one of the silicate alkaline minerals and has a high weathering rate. The efficiency of ocean alkalinity enhancement is affected by the dissolution rate and diffusion rate of olivine. On the offshore olivine reaction platform, the method of grinding olivine to accelerate its dissolution based on clean energy and diffusing high-alkalinity seawater through ocean currents to accelerate the absorption of atmospheric carbon dioxide has broad application prospects. With the exploration of offshore oil and gas resources in China, the combination of olivine offshore reaction platform and offshore oil and gas platform can not only save the construction cost of olivine offshore platform, but also capture the carbon dioxide during the producing process of oil and gas, which will further increase the efficiency of carbon sequestration.

Keywords

• alkaline mineral
• olivine
• carbon capture
• olivine offshore reaction platform