Something Sciency, Cool, & Interesting: The Series
Episode 1: Diamonds being made from the Carbon in the Air
Links:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/30/ecotricity-founder-to-grow-diamonds-made-entirely-from-the-sky#:~:text=Dale%20Vince%2C%20the%20founder%20of,sky%20mining%20facility%E2%80%9D%20in%20Stroud.
https://news.sky.com/story/eco-friendly-diamonds-developed-using-carbon-sucked-from-the-air-bling-without-the-sting-12118523
SUMMARISED
I absolutely love this! Whilst I am not the biggest fan of gemstones, I do know many people who are, and this is such a wonderful way to make these wonderful gems at a lower impact to environment!
The diamonds are certified by the International Gemological Institute, meaning they are pretty much chemically and physically identical to the real ones.
Not only does this allow people to continue buying diamonds in a way that is completely sustainable (it actually has a negative carbon impact because the carbon from the air is now being locked into a very permanent form), but it will most likely make them faster to produce and cheaper to buy.
Currently, the diamond mining industry causes incredible ecological devastation, from rerouting rivers to causing soil erosion. From this link: https://www.brilliantearth.com/blood-diamond-environmental-impact/ - “Diamond miners in the Kono district of eastern Sierra Leone have left behind thousands of abandoned mining pits. Wildlife has vanished, topsoil has eroded, and land once suitable for farming is now a desolate moonscape. The mining pits have created a public health disaster as well. When the pits fill with stagnant rainwater, they become infested with mosquitoes, spreading malaria and other water-borne diseases.” This is an excellent example of the negative impact of diamond mining.
Also, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is now at 412 parts per million! That could be used to make a lot of diamonds.
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2915/the-atmosphere-getting-a-handle-on-carbon-dioxide/#:~:text=The%20concentration%20of%20carbon%20dioxide,it%20was%20near%20370%20ppm.
This graph illustrates the steadily increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (in parts per million) observed at NOAA's Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii over the course of 60 years. Measurements of the greenhouse gas began in 1959.