Carbon dioxide and Ozone can faster-repaired before mid-century by using Activated carbon as a medium – Bring it to atmosphere and let it do boring adsorption and absorption works

Carbon dioxide (chemical formula CO₂) is a chemical compound made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in the gas state at room temperature.

In the air, carbon dioxide is transparent to visible light but absorbs infrared radiation, acting as a greenhouse gas. It is a trace gas in Earth's atmosphere at 417 ppm (about 0.04%) by volume, having risen from pre-industrial levels of 280 ppm. Burning fossil fuels is the primary cause of these increased CO₂ concentrations and also the primary cause of global warming and climate change. Carbon dioxide is soluble in water and is found in groundwater, lakes, ice caps, and seawater. When carbon dioxide dissolves in water it forms carbonic acid (H₂CO₃), which causes ocean acidification as atmospheric CO₂ levels increase.

Carbon dioxide is 53% denser than dry air but is long-lived and thoroughly mixed in the atmosphere. About half of excess CO₂ emissions to the atmosphere are absorbed by land and ocean carbon sinks. These sinks can become saturated and are volatile, as decay and wildfires result in the CO₂ being released back into the atmosphere. CO₂ is eventually sequestered (stored for the long term) in rocks and organic deposits like coal, petroleum, and natural gas.

In Earth’s Atmosphere

Carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere is a trace gas, having a global average concentration of 415 parts per million by volume (or 630 parts per million by mass) as of the end of the year 2020. Atmospheric CO₂ concentrations fluctuate slightly with the seasons, falling during the Northern Hemisphere spring and summer as plants consume the gas and rising during northern autumn and winter as plants go dormant or die and decay. Concentrations also vary on a regional basis, most strongly near the ground with much smaller variations aloft. In urban areas concentrations are generally higher and indoors they can reach 10 times background levels. CO₂ emissions have also led to the stratosphere contracting by 400 meters since 1980, which could affect satellite operations, GPS systems, and radio communications.

The concentration of carbon dioxide has risen due to human activities. The extraction and burning of fossil fuels, using carbon that has been sequestered for many millions of years in the lithosphere, has caused the atmospheric concentration of CO₂ to increase by about 50% since the beginning of the age of industrialization up to the year 2020. Most CO₂ from human activities is released from burning coal, petroleum, and natural gas. Other large anthropogenic sources include cement production, deforestation, and biomass burning. Human activities emit over 30 billion tons of CO₂ (9 billion tons of fossil carbon) per year, while volcanoes emit only between 0.2 and 0.3 billion tons of CO₂. Human activities have caused CO₂ to increase above levels not seen in hundreds of thousands of years. Currently, about half of the carbon dioxide released from the burning of fossil fuels remains in the atmosphere and is not absorbed by vegetation and the oceans.

Increases in atmospheric concentrations of CO₂ and other long-lived greenhouse gases such as methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone have strengthened their absorption and emission of infrared radiation, causing the rise in average global temperature since the mid-20th century. Carbon dioxide is of greatest concern because it exerts a larger overall warming influence than all of these other gases combined.

Ozone (/ˈoʊzoʊn/), or trioxygen, is an inorganic molecule with the chemical formula O₃. It is a pale blue gas with a distinctively pungent smell. It is an allotrope of oxygen that is much less stable than the diatomic allotrope O₂, breaking down in the lower atmosphere to O₂ (dioxygen). Ozone is formed from dioxygen by the action of ultraviolet (UV) light and electrical discharges within the Earth's atmosphere. It is present in very low concentrations throughout the latter, with its highest concentration high in the ozone layer of the stratosphere, which absorbs most of the Sun's ultraviolet (UV) radiation.

Ozone is a powerful oxidant (far more so than dioxygen) and has many industrial and consumer applications related to oxidation. This same high oxidizing potential, however, causes ozone to damage mucous and respiratory tissues in animals, and also tissues in plants, above concentrations of about 0.1 ppm. While this makes ozone a potent respiratory hazard and pollutant near ground level, a higher concentration in the ozone layer (from two to eight ppm) is beneficial, preventing damaging UV light from reaching the Earth's surface.

Ozone as a greenhouse gas

Although ozone was present at ground level before the Industrial Revolution, peak concentrations are now far higher than the pre-industrial levels, and even background concentrations well away from sources of pollution are substantially higher. Ozone acts as a greenhouse gas, absorbing some of the infrared energy emitted by the earth. Quantifying the greenhouse gas potency of ozone is difficult because it is not present in uniform concentrations across the globe. However, the most widely accepted scientific assessments relating to climate change (e.g. the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Third Assessment Report) suggest that the radiative forcing of tropospheric ozone is about 25% that of carbon dioxide.

The annual global warming potential of tropospheric ozone is between 918 and 1022 tons carbon dioxide equivalent/tons tropospheric ozone. This means on a per-molecule basis, ozone in the troposphere has a radiative forcing effect roughly 1,000 times as strong as carbon dioxide. However, tropospheric ozone is a short-lived greenhouse gas, which decays in the atmosphere much more quickly than carbon dioxide. This means that over a 20-year span, the global warming potential of tropospheric ozone is much less, roughly 62 to 69 tons carbon dioxide equivalent / ton tropospheric ozone.

Because of its short-lived nature, tropospheric ozone does not have strong global effects but has very strong radiative forcing effects on regional scales. In fact, there are regions of the world where tropospheric ozone has a radiative forcing up to 150% of carbon dioxide. For example, ozone increase in the troposphere is shown to be responsible for ~30% of upper Southern Ocean interior warming between 1955 and 2000.

 

Powdered activated carbon can be used to adsorb and absorb CO2 and Ozone pollution in the atmosphere

Activated carbons are complex products that are difficult to classify on the basis of their behavior, surface characteristics, and other fundamental criteria. Activated carbon is carbon produced from carbonaceous source materials such as bamboo, coconut husk, willow peat, wood, coir, lignite, coal, and petroleum pitch. It can be produced (activated) by Chemical activation processes: The carbon material is impregnated with certain chemicals. The chemical is typically an acid, strong base, or salt (phosphoric acid 25%, potassium hydroxide 5%, sodium hydroxide 5%, calcium chloride 25%, and zinc chloride 25%). The carbon is then subjected to high temperatures (250–600 °C). It is believed that the temperature activates the carbon at this stage by forcing the material to open up and have more microscopic pores. Chemical activation is preferred to physical activation owing to the lower temperatures, better quality consistency, and shorter time needed for activating the material.

Normally, activated carbons (R 1) are made in particulate form as powders or fine granules less than 1.0 mm in size with an average diameter between 0.15 and 0.25 mm. Thus they present a large surface-to-volume ratio with a small diffusion distance. Activated carbon (R 1) is defined as the activated carbon particles retained on a 50-mesh sieve (0.297 mm). A gram of activated carbon can have a surface area in excess of 500 m² (5,400 sq ft), with 3,000 m² (32,000 sq ft) being readily achievable.

James Dewar, the scientist after whom the Dewar (vacuum flask) is named, spent much time studying activated carbon and published a paper regarding its adsorption capacity with regard to gases. In this paper, he discovered that cooling the carbon to liquid nitrogen temperatures allowed it to adsorb significant quantities of numerous air gases, among others, that could then be recollected by simply allowing the carbon to warm again and that coconut-based carbon was superior for the effect. He uses oxygen as an example, wherein the activated carbon would typically adsorb the atmospheric concentration (21%) under standard conditions, but release over 80% oxygen if the carbon was first cooled to low temperatures.

In the long-run, powdered activated carbon will change shape to hardened activated carbon, if no action is taken to shake it or mix it into granules powders. Hardened activated carbon means it already reaches the limit to proper functions as adsorbed and absorbed medium. To keep it in the best function as an adsorbed and absorbed of air gases, it must be in powdered activated carbon. Hardened activated carbon can also be a new form of commodity as a fuel in the future.

Airships capable to carry powdered activated carbon to the atmosphere with environmental benefits

An aerostat is an aircraft that remains aloft using buoyancy or static lift, as opposed to the aerodyne, which obtains lift by moving through the air. Airships are a type of aerostat. The term aerostat has also been used to indicate a tethered or moored balloon as opposed to a free-floating balloon. Aerostats today are capable of lifting a payload of 3,000 pounds (1,400 kg) to an altitude of more than 4.5 kilometers (2.8 mi) above sea level. They can also stay in the air for extended periods of time, particularly when powered by an onboard generator or if the tether contains electrical conductors. Due to this capability, aerostats can be used as platforms for telecommunication services. For instance, Platform Wireless International Corporation announced in 2001 that it would use a tethered 1,250 pounds (570 kg) airborne payload to deliver cellular phone service to a 140 miles (230 km) region in Brazil. The European Union's ABSOLUTE project was also reportedly exploring the use of tethered aerostat stations to provide telecommunications during disaster response.

The main advantage of airships with respect to any other vehicle is of environmental nature. They require less energy to remain in flight if compared to any other air vehicle. The proposed Varialift airship, powered by a mixture of solar-powered engines and conventional jet engines, would use only an estimated 8 percent of the fuel required by jet aircraft. Furthermore, utilizing the jet stream could allow for a faster and more energy-efficient cargo transport alternative to maritime shipping. This is one of the reasons why China has embraced its use recently.