A Gift of Optimism for Moms

For you. And for the other mothers and kids in your life

Credit: Natalya Zaritskaya via Unsplash

Here’s our Mother’s Day Message, especially for moms who worry about their children and climate despair.

1. Yes, the situation is dire. Yet No, we are not doomed!  (That answers the #1 question we get. )

Despite the desperately bad news recently, we actually already have the knowledge, the technology, and the financing we need to restore a safe climate. A safe climate is one that humans have thrived in over the long term, with much lower greenhouse gas levels than we now have. Applying that know-how is now a question of awareness, will and leadership, including leadership from people like you!

Many nations and people are working toward net zero emissions. Yay! But there’s something bigger that needs to happen, something that few scientists or activists even discuss yet: We also need to restore historically safe levels of CO2 by removing a trillion tons of “legacy” CO2 from the atmosphere, accumulated since the start of the industrial revolution.  

Cause for optimism? Our research shows that we could remove this humongous amount safely, safely, swiftly, and inexpensively. And it could be done by 2050.

2. Mother Earth shows us the way

Nature has managed CO2 for eons. Leading up to ice ages, she lowers CO2 levels and temperatures about as much as we need to do now.

Restoring a safe climate does NOT require new technology (what works best has been in use for millions of  years).  Or a lot of land (it can happen in a tiny fraction of the ocean).  Or boatloads of money (nothing like what we’re spending down on high-tech carbon-dioxide removal).

3. Climate restoration is eminently feasible using Nature’s CO2 management in parts of the ocean

Nature’s most powerful climate restoration solution? She pulls down CO2 and temperatures before an ice age by boosting photosynthesis in the sea. Just as you might take iron supplements for low iron (anemia), Nature distributes iron supplements to anemic parts of the ocean. That happens through increasing dust storms: more iron-rich dust blows off land and out to sea, where it fertilizes patches of ocean. We learned this only about 30 years ago.

With minute amounts of iron fertilizer (plus the nutrients that are already in the water) microscopic green plants bloom. Through photosynthesis, these “phytoplankton” absorb a lot of CO2 as well as feeding fish and other marine life. When they die, the CO2 sinks and gets stored away in the deep.  

Can we replicate this natural CO2 removal? Of course, with biomimicry—sophisticated process design that copies Nature’s ways. In fact we’ve already done this—it’s been demonstrated over a dozen times, with no ill effects observed.

4. We can make roads and buildings out of CO2

We know how corals and oysters make limestone by building shells from calcium and CO2. And limestone is nearly half CO2 by weight!

Thanks to biomimicry again, we can now manufacture high-quality “synthetic” limestone. So we can literally build and pave with CO2!  Concrete made with synthetic limestone is already in use at the San Francisco International Airport. It’s strongly carbon-negative—storing about half a ton of CO2 in each cubic meter of concrete. With more investment, the industry is poised to expand nationally and worldwide.

5. Climate-restoration methods are remarkably inexpensive

Nature packs away CO2 for free, so climate-restoration solutions that follow Nature turn out to be the best bargain around.

From pilot and current projects, we estimate that $1-2 billion a year would pay for  biomimicry methods to restore a safe climate by 2050. So ending the climate crisis could be financed voluntarily by philanthropy.  Government funding, while welcome, would not be needed.

6. Climate restoration is an idea whose time has come

In July 2023, California’s Senate unanimously passed a resolution calling on the state and the nation to restore our climate. Similar resolutions are being considered in other states and at the national level.

And this year, the Bezos Earth Fund framed their Greenhouse Gas Removal (GHGR) Ideation Prize around the goal of “returning greenhouse gas concentrations to pre-industrial levels.” In addition, MIT announced “Restoring the atmosphere” as a new climate Mission.

7. You can help end the climate crisis! 

You can learn more at FoundationforClimateRestoration.org. And PeterFiekowsky.com. 

To dive deeper, see Climate Restoration—The Only Future That Will Sustain the Human Race. You’ll find extensive background and references. 

The climate restoration movement welcomes you! You can support it by joining the Foundation for Climate Restoration (F4CR)—where you can learn and practice valuable advocacy and outreach skills. You can also donate to F4CR.

And be sure to talk about climate restoration!  We’ll only get there when people know it’s possible.

Happy Mother’s Day!