There are two main incentives for this, the first being the geological feature that natural gas is in finite supply and world production of it is thought might peak within the next few decades, and secondly that burning fossil carbon contributes to the atmospheric concentration of CO2, which scientific consensus accords will cause global warming and climate change.
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The best solution, nearly all scientists agree, would be the simplest: stop burning fossil fuels, which would reduce the amount of carbon we dump into the atmosphere.
One concept that is getting pursued is the recycling of carbon dioxide emissions, or those releases that result from the burning of petroleum, coal and natural gas.
Current models show that Earth is getting warmer and warmer due to increased emissions of carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels and other human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases.
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The science of global warming is politically controversial but generally accepted as fact by most researchers, who point to heat-trapping carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels as the major cause.
And, by promising to capture 90% of its carbon, SCS Energy can get away with burning the cheapest but dirtiest source of baseload fuel (coal) in the most expensive retail electricity market in the country.
Engineers have built a contraption of water heater size that strips hydrogen out of natural gas while burning the carbon to provide heat for the home.
Carbon dioxide, the result of burning fuel, is, together with water and sunlight, the raw material of photosynthesis.
Because of the burning of fossil fuels, such as oil and coal, carbon dioxide levels have gone up by that amount in just 55 years.
Economists generally agree that the key to addressing climate change is to raise the cost of burning fossil fuels, either directly, through a carbon tax, or indirectly, through a cap-and-trade program.
The academics advocate concentrating first on short-term fixes for greenhouse gases or other warming agents, such as black carbon - particles emitted from the incomplete burning of fossil fuels, principally in diesel engines and wood stoves.
For extra credit, perhaps one of you enterprising readers would like to calculate how much carbon dioxide has been released into the air by the burning of 6.3 million gallons of oil.
Carbon monoxide is a colourless, odourless gas produced by the burning of fuels, including gas, oil, wood and coal.
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Converting coal to gas before burning it is plausible, but finding an economical way to dispose of the carbon dioxide besides venting it is, to put it mildly, an ambitious goal.
As well as destroying such native ecosystems, deforestation also diminishes so-called "carbon sinks" -- thereby reducing the Earth's capacity to absorb and re-process atmospheric carbon dioxide -- while also adding to air pollution through the burning of land to clear it for cultivation (sugarcane fields are traditionally fired prior to harvest to remove leaves and drive away snakes).
In theory biofuels produce low net emissions of carbon dioxide, since burning them merely recycles atmospheric carbon absorbed by the plant as it was growing.
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Of course, carbon taxes (on burning fossil fuels) would provide the easiest way for countries to comply with the system, and each country could then decide what to do with the tax revenue.
Gas flaring (burning off natural gas released by oil drilling) in the delta produces 70 million metric tons of carbon emissions a year -- "a substantial proportion of worldwide greenhouse gas, " according to the World Bank.
About 90% of Poland's electricity is generated from burning coal, a fuel blamed for increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere.
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