The controversial machine sending CO2 to the ocean and making hydrogen

The controversial machine sending CO2 to the ocean and making hydrogen Equatic Equatic is among a wave of start-ups exploring how the ocean could be harnessed to capture and store carbon. "Marine CO2 removal is simply too risky," says Mary Church, geoengineering campaign manager at the Center for International Environmental Law, a non-profit environmental law firm based in Geneva, Switzerland. The captured carbon is also highly stable, she says, and both Equatic and Ebb Carbon, another ocean-based carbon removal company based in San Carlos in California whose technology also reduces ocean acidification, are "expected to be able to remove carbon durably for over a thousand years". At a scale to meaningfully impact the climate, marine CO2 removal would be inherently unpredictable and pose significant, new and unprecedented risks to the fragile ecosystems that sustain life on Earth – Mary Church But even as companies like Equatic are polishing off their processes and doubling down on huge scale-up plans, many are concerned that a rapid increase in the use of ocean carbon removal technologies is not such a great idea. "At a scale to meaningfully impact the climate, marine CO2 removal would be inherently unpredictable and pose significant, new and unprecedented risks to the fragile ecosystems that sustain life on Earth," says Church.