 Philip Kithil, Atmocean CEO
SANTA FE, N.M. – When Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and
the Gulf Coast, it set entrepreneur Philip Kithil’s inventive juices
flowing. He knew that hurricane intensity depends, in large part, on
the storm developing over warm sea water.
“I began to mull over whether it would be possible to bring up large
quantities of cold water to lessen hurricane intensity,” said Mr.
Kathil, 64, who came up with the idea of a wave-driven upwelling pump.
Although his original idea was directed toward hurricanes, it soon became evident in discussions with scientists, Mr. Kithil said, that by bringing nutrient-rich cold water to the sea surface, the pumps could also set off a dynamic biological process in which zooplankton ingest carbon dioxide from phytoplankton blooming on the sea surface and excrete it as carbon pellets, which sink to the ocean floor.
Realizing his pumps could provide one solution to global warming, Mr. Kithil changed his focus. A career entrepreneur who gravitates “toward the high risk and high reward,” he took the capital he had made in a prior business and formed Atmocean, a privately held company, to develop the wave-driven upwelling pump technology.
Mr. Kithil described the technology as “very simple, really,” consisting of a buoy riding the sea surface, a long flexible tube about ¾ meter in diameter that unspools 500 to 1,000 meters into the water, and a valve assembly at the bottom, connected to the buoy by a wire. When the buoy descends on the downslope of a wave, the wire opens the valve and nutrient-rich cold water enters the tube, a process which is known as upwelling. On the upslope of the wave, the wire shuts the valve. When the nutrient-rich cold water comes out of the tube at the ocean surface and spreads horizontally, it creates a major food source for the tiny ocean plants known as phytoplankton near the surface. They multiply, and through the process of photosynthesis, take up carbon dioxide in the presence of sunlight, releasing oxygen and water as byproducts. “With upwelling we are throwing a buffet party in the upper ocean and all are welcome to join in the feast,” Mr. Kithil told an electric utility conference earlier this year. The zooplankton eating the phytoplankton then excrete the unusable carbon in the form of dense pellets, which then sink to the bottom of the sea, where they would stay undisturbed essentially forever.
Mr. Kithil’s gamble is that his pump would set off a process which resulted in large-scale carbon capture and long-term sequestration on the ocean floor. Since the world’s oceans absorb about one third of global carbon emissions, Mr. Kithil believes that upwelling pumps deployed in grids beyond the 200-mile ocean national economic zones (and out of the way of shipping lanes and fishing grounds) could become a large-scale technical fix to global warming, capturing up to 30 percent of the oceans’ carbon.
“It’s a challenge to create an idea and make it happen, both physically by building prototypes and developing a path to market—that’s where I get my satisfaction,” said Mr. Kithil. “Then there’s the potential benefit to mankind. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
The Atmocean CEO said he’s currently trying to raise venture capital to continue testing the company’s wave-driven upwelling pump. “We’ve done 17 different ocean tests, so we know the pump technology works,” he said. “We have yet to do an assessment of the biological affects. We have to get the data and prove it. We’re realistically three years of development before we’re ready for an operating system.”
Some ocean scientists have expressed doubts that attempts to bring nutrients to the sea surface, or fertilize it with iron particles—another idea under development—would result in lower ocean acidification or carbon removal. For one thing, carbon concentration is greater at depth, so it’s possible that upwelling could result in carbon outgassing and increased acidification.
Mr. Kithil said he’s also gambling that when his pumps are ready for deployment, he’ll have customers. He said he’s looking toward the developing markets in carbon emissions credits. “We’re not a polluting company, but we would generate carbon credits and sell them on carbon market” to companies required to reduce their emissions or purchase credits as a penalty under the Kyoto Treaty and its successor, he said.
How long will it take those carbon markets to develop? “It’s really an issue of legislation being passed in the U.S. that either duplicates Kyoto or if Kyoto is renewed and the U.S. ratifies. I think the time frame is 2010-2012.”
To learn more about Atmocean, visit the company’s website.
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