Icelandic scientists are transforming carbon dioxide into stone

(Image credit: Maja Hitij/Bongarts/Getty Images)

published 16 December 2019

The news about the world's warming climate is generally bad — the Arctic is melting at an alarming rate, the real costs are mounting, and while some regions are grappling with how to reduce greenhouse gasses, the world can't agree on a unified solution. So here's some good news: Researchers in Iceland have discovered how to take the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2), neutralize it, and turn it into harmless rock, WBUR's Here & Now reports.

Specifically, the Carbfix team injects CO2 into Iceland's ample basalt, turning the gas into organic white crystals.

For the Carbfix process to work, project manager Kári Helgason explained, "you need a lot of water, it can be seawater. You need favorable rock formations. And you need CO2." Since Carbfix is based at the clean-energy geothermal plants common in Iceland, "we're lacking the stream of CO2," he adds. And basalt works better than the sedimentary rock earlier carbon-injection processes use, says Sandra Ósk Snæbjörnsdóttir, Carbfix's chief geoscientist:

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Sedimentary rock, she says, contains softer material that gets washed away leaving only silica behind. It's also not reactive. But basalt rock contains metals that are needed to react with the C02 and turn it into stone. To facilitate the process, she explains, Carbfix infuses the CO2 with water, killing the gas' buoyancy. Then, she says, "it sinks instead of rising up." [Here & Now]

"It's a biblical image — researchers are taking one of the most dangerous drivers of climate change and turning it into stone," Here & Now says. The technology is scalable and replicable anywhere there's basalt, or the gasses can be transported to Iceland, and once it scales up, it could solve the climate crisis, Carbfix says. Listen below. Peter Weber

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.