Translated material
Carbon dioxide millions
Scientists were promised a huge bonus for defeating greenhouse gases
The anomalous winter of 2007, with its high temperatures and almost summer-like storms, could bring scientists not only new material for research, but also additional funding. Climate surprises seem to have fed up eccentric British billionaire Richard Branson so much that he has decided to personally incentivize a researcher who promises to reduce the impact of greenhouse gases on the Earth's atmosphere. Last Friday, Mr. Branson launched a new $25 million international prize for discoveries that would clear excess carbon dioxide from the airspace around the planet. According to AP, the billionaire announced this a week after the publication of another apocalyptic report predicting that the greenhouse effect will contribute to warming over the next 100 years and change the Earth beyond recognition. “Man created this problem, man must solve it,” said Branson, offering scientists a prize substantially larger than the Nobel Prize.The proposal of even such a master of outrageousness as Richard Branson could not go unnoticed. Although most of the projects of the owner of Virgin Atlantic Airways are viewed in the scientific community with a certain degree of skepticism - it is enough to remember that he promised to make the space tourism market accessible in just a few years. The billionaire’s earthly plans are no less ambitious - he intends to direct all the profits of his transport companies, which is about $3 billion, to solve environmental problems. “I want my children and grandchildren to have a future. Time has passed, we can’t wait any longer,” the BBC quotes the statement of Mr. Branson, who attracted former US Vice President Al Gore to support and promote his new project.
Together, they set the researchers a task: to extract up to 1 billion tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere annually, and then store these substances in a liquid or solid state in special storage facilities. It is expected that the first $5 million will be allocated to the researcher immediately after a reputable jury, which Branson hopes will include climate scientists, astronomers, and physicists, confirms that the proposed invention for extracting carbon dioxide from the air works at all. The rest will be supplied gradually over 10 years and only if the amount of “bound” gas is significant, which will give hope for solving the problem of global warming.
In fact, this is the second time Richard Branson has set scientists the task of constructing a certain device, which he himself presents in very general terms. In the same way, he began construction of the lightweight rocket plane SpaceShipOne - the first private spacecraft, which, although not on the first try, still made a suborbital flight. Now the billionaire insists that the fight against greenhouse gases should be carried out not only through the construction of wastewater treatment plants at industrial enterprises. The carbon dioxide that enters the atmosphere (and, according to experts attracted by Mr. Branson, this is up to 7 billion tons per year) must be extracted.
Critics of this initiative argue that such a revolutionary technique does not yet exist. In any case, no one has been able to “sequester” carbon dioxide on the scale required to solve the greenhouse gas problem. But Richard Branson is not deterred by such skepticism, since he believes that if the main task is seen only in reducing emissions, then the technique will never appear. He said that the jury that determines the winner of his prize will meet annually and consider all discoveries that could stop global warming on Earth.