Hungry Oceans Dummies' GuideThe Pipes
MORE OCEANS* The pipes themselves are made of polypropylene, with a long stainless steel cable running down the interior length of the pipe to a 200-pound stainless steel valve at the bottom. Using stainless steel will prevent rust, which would put iron into the water and distort the results. * The pipes have not been subjected to a rigorous structural analysis, and computational fluid dynamics have not modeled how they work. But 17 pipes have now been tested on 12 cruises, and Phil Kithil (CEO of Atmocean, a private company dedicated to slowing CO2 levels) has learned mainly from experience. In each deployment, he has learned how to make them stronger. There has never been catastrophic damage to the pipes — a few spot welds have broken, and a temperature sensor broke free. * The mixing pattern created by the pumps involves a brief vertical descent of cold water, until it reaches a buoyant layer, where it spreads horizontally. It's been described like a smoke stack in reverse. * In the team's vision, the spacing of the pipes will be 2 kilometers to avoid entangling. In terms of the mixing effect, increasing the spacing decreases the density of nutrients per unit area. * The pipes have sometimes had a tendency to sit slightly in the wave, but never remained stationary like a vertical sea anchor. The buoy and pipe material provide 1,600 pounds of buoyancy. The cable and valve provide 250 pounds of the reproduced plankton. As the diatoms proliferate in these rich nutrient conditions, the bloom grows massively. But it will reach a point where the bloom has grown faster than the nutrients are being supplied. The edges of the bloom will start struggling. Nitrate becomes limited in that region. Dead diatoms contain phosphate that other plankton can absorb for their growth; all the while more phosphate is pumped into the region. * A potential byproduct of the pipes is "aquaculture" — the pipes could create farms in the sea and increase dwindling fish stocks. |
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