You might not know it, but the hot water and rocks deep within Earth are teeming with undiscovered life. Dr. Tanvi Govil is one of the biologists studying this new frontier of microbial life that thrives in extreme places.
He had a breach in his ship but fixed it and went back and saved Rocky and sent the samples of whatever it was that was eating the stuff that was destroying humans.
An interstellar microbe feeding on stars (astrophage) was the danger to humanity. They figured out it breeds on planets. But the distant planet they found had different alien microbial life that just happened to be very good at feeding on the interstellar star eaters that had chosen to breed there.
So they took samples, cultured the microbe-eating-microbes, and left to take them home. But the human guy figured out they broke containment and ate some fuel his starship uses, that Rocky’s starship happened to be made of, so he used his remaining fuel to change course and warn Rocky.
So… the CO2 eater analogy actually makes some sense. If we’re lucky this could lead to major geoengineering breakthrough, like the movie microbes did (though I wouldn’t get my hopes up).
In this case, the parasite is humanity. Or emissions-heavy industry. Or oil executives. Something like that.
I sure hope so. I work in electricity generation (not coal) and I see this being potentially massive for all fuel types. Depending on if/how it can be scaled. Combined cycle was huge for emissions reduction. But this could be a completely new level if we can reduce to zero/near zero and have a useful byproduct.
Only if there’s incentive for the added cost, though. I’m skeptical such scrubbers could produce something useful enough to offset the cost by themselves.
I’d imagine if the tech gets there it will be so heavily subsidized (at least in the US) that cost won’t be a huge concern. Plus if its producing a useful biproduct that might be a decent revenue booster.
So reading through they think it can be used to eventually make huge filters they can use for coal plants and stuff like that.
If true this could be like whatever it was they found in Project Hail Mary that ends up saving the human race.
Uh, that would kill amost all life on earth, if it was an excuse to keep burning coal
The thing they found in Project Hail Mary also happened to be the thing that was killing the human race.
Wait the stuff at the end?
He had a breach in his ship but fixed it and went back and saved Rocky and sent the samples of whatever it was that was eating the stuff that was destroying humans.
Spoilers:
spoiler
An interstellar microbe feeding on stars (astrophage) was the danger to humanity. They figured out it breeds on planets. But the distant planet they found had different alien microbial life that just happened to be very good at feeding on the interstellar star eaters that had chosen to breed there.
So they took samples, cultured the microbe-eating-microbes, and left to take them home. But the human guy figured out they broke containment and ate some fuel his starship uses, that Rocky’s starship happened to be made of, so he used his remaining fuel to change course and warn Rocky.
So… the CO2 eater analogy actually makes some sense. If we’re lucky this could lead to major geoengineering breakthrough, like the movie microbes did (though I wouldn’t get my hopes up).
In this case, the parasite is humanity. Or emissions-heavy industry. Or oil executives. Something like that.
I sure hope so. I work in electricity generation (not coal) and I see this being potentially massive for all fuel types. Depending on if/how it can be scaled. Combined cycle was huge for emissions reduction. But this could be a completely new level if we can reduce to zero/near zero and have a useful byproduct.
Only if there’s incentive for the added cost, though. I’m skeptical such scrubbers could produce something useful enough to offset the cost by themselves.
I’d imagine if the tech gets there it will be so heavily subsidized (at least in the US) that cost won’t be a huge concern. Plus if its producing a useful biproduct that might be a decent revenue booster.
I’m glad we don’t have to worry or change anything. I was stressing there. So much relief!