The world’s climate cabal gathers in Copenhagen next month to debate what to do with the 30 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide the human race produces every year by burning fossil fuels. Half of this man-made exhaust is absorbed by oceans, plants and trees. The rest contributes to the atmospheric build-up of greenhouse gas that has climate scientists envisioning global catastrophe.

After the Copenhagen attendees talk up wind, solar, nuclear and spray-foam insulation, a bold solution that will inevitably come up is to capture and sequester some of that carbon dioxide deep underground. Geologic cavities in the U.S. alone could hold between 2,020 and 14,220 billion tons of CO2, enough to soak up three to 36 months of national output. Doing so would cost $200 or so per ton of carbon. It would require permits from local, state and federal agencies and would generate a good deal of anxiety for those living above the gas. In 1986, a volcano crater in Cameroon released a CO2 bubble large enough to kill 1,800 people while they slept.

Read More: http://www.forbes.com/2009/11/03/carbon-sequestration-business-energy-copenhagen-15-burial.html