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Re:Elon Musk to offer $100M prize for 'best' carbon capture ... by akdav on Friday January 22, 2021 @03:21AM (#25869585)
Why are people today so sceptical of anything that looks like good intentions?
Re:Elon Musk to offer $100M prize for 'best' carbon capture ... by totalZero on Friday January 22, 2021 @09:23AM (#25871885)
A person who has good intentions for the environment doesn't generally attempt to become the Henry Ford of kerosene-powered spaceflight.
Re:Elon Musk to offer $100M prize for 'best' carbon capture ... by mlindner on Friday January 22, 2021 @12:45PM (#25874040)
I'm going to assume you aren't trying to be disingenuous.

First off, the kerosene rockets are going to be replaced with methane ones so that will greatly reduce the carbon output.

Secondly, he has stated many times that once they're flying regularly they'll be creating methane fuel themselves from carbon capture.

Additionally, you have to expel mass to build a rocket. That's a requirement. You can do it with no carbon with hydrogen-oxygen rockets, but hydrogen has a lot of issues with it. Also much as people like to talk about hydrogen being green, the vast majority of all current Hydrogen is from methane steam reforming and has quite the carbon footprint.

Re:Elon Musk to offer $100M prize for 'best' carbon capture ... by totalZero on Friday January 22, 2021 @02:51PM (#25875528)
> I'm going to assume you aren't trying to be disingenuous.

If you truly make that assumption, why start by casting aspersions on my sincerity?

> First off, the kerosene rockets are going to be replaced with methane ones so that will greatly reduce the carbon output.

Mr. Musk envisions hundreds of flights of methane-powered rockets with immense payload capacity in the thousands of tons. Methane combustion produces CO2. A Starship flight will put more CO2 into the air than a Falcon Heavy flight. Its advantages are likely to be less NOx and less soot.

> Secondly, he has stated many times that once they're flying regularly they'll be creating methane fuel themselves from carbon capture.

This barely exists in a laboratory yet, let alone at the scale needed for retail spaceflight. Ask yourself, where do we get methane these days? Answer: Largely from fracking and as a byproduct to other fossil fuel harvesting/processing.

> Additionally, you have to expel mass to build a rocket. That's a requirement. You can do it with no carbon with hydrogen-oxygen rockets, but hydrogen has a lot of issues with it. Also much as people like to talk about hydrogen being green, the vast majority of all current Hydrogen is from methane steam reforming and has quite the carbon footprint.

Now you're starting to see my point. Someone who is focused only on creating green technologies wouldn't put his solvency on the line to build and grow a fossil-fuel-based space propulsion company. Space flight is critical to the future of mankind, but we have to be clear-eyed about its ramifications and avoid greenwashing it for the benefit of corporations. $100m sounds like a lot of money until you compare it to Mr. Musk's net worth.

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Re:Elon Musk to offer $100M prize for 'best' carbon capture ... by loceng on Friday January 22, 2021 @02:05PM (#25874934)
Replace people with people in general, and reread - maybe you don't qualify, maybe you do - people's self-awareness and ability to orient is pretty bad in general too when it comes to health. However you've done nothing to prove your point other than taking what I said literally and taking offense to it, instead of arguing the point as to if my point has merit or not.

You're making assumptions that I don't see there will be environmental impact - it can however be offset and I believe rockets to get things into space is an area where we'll have to accept and compromise - at least until if a space elevator becomes possible.

Re:Elon Musk to offer $100M prize for 'best' carbon capture ... by totalZero on Friday January 22, 2021 @03:06PM (#25875709)
> Replace people with people in general, and reread - maybe you don't qualify, maybe you do - people's self-awareness and ability to orient is pretty bad in general too when it comes to health. However you've done nothing to prove your point other than taking what I said literally and taking offense to it, instead of arguing the point as to if my point has merit or not.

A) You're clearly not writing nor addressing anything in this thread that is germane to carbon capture, spaceflight, Mr. Musk, or any other aspect of the article.

B) The simple fact that you're talking about me and my relationship to my peers and family is evidence that you have focused the conversation on the qualities of a speaker rather than the merits of his speech. Please re-evaluate the thread and see how you arrived at this juncture.