A novel experiment to study ways to slow climate change that includes dumping thousands of pounds of sodium hydroxide, commonly referred to as lye, into waters about nine miles from Nomans Land has raised concerns among some regional environmental entities and local fishery groups.
The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, or WHOI, applied for two ocean dumping permits to test a climate change mitigation technique in an experiment never done before. One of the permits would approve a phase of the study to take place off the Island’s coast over five days within a few months.
The experiment is a response to calls for increased research into marine carbon dioxide removal technologies, partly a result of an inability to rely solely on reducing carbon emissions.
Though the experiment hopes to investigate a potential technique to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, some local and regional stakeholders, including the Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association, argue that the experiment poses hazards to marine life and lacks potential to be scaled up safely.
But scientists and federal officials say the experiment would outweigh any environmental concerns and that the substances used would be safe.
The area off the Island’s south coast was chosen partially because it is already a well-studied area. Also, the water has stratification tendencies — warm water on top separated by cold water on the bottom — in the late summer, which would be beneficial to the experiment.
The Vineyard Conservation Society, however, thinks the choice is suboptimal as an important commercial and recreational fishing area, site of current and future wind farms, and a feeding ground for an endangered whale species.
“While the proposed experiment may be small in comparative impact, we believe this area should be spared any additional pressure,” Jeremy Houser, director of science and policy at the Vineyard Conservation Society, said.
The location is merely a testing ground and not where the technique would ever be used on a larger scale, Suzanne Pelisson, public relations director for WHOI, told The Times.
WHOI associate researcher Dr. Adam Subhas applied for permits to the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, in May. Officials with the federal agency have already said that the benefits of the experiment could outweigh any environmental damage, citing the project’s intentions to keep water quality mostly at drinking water standards.
The project is called LOC-NESS, also known as Locking away Ocean Carbon in the Northeast Shelf and Slope (and the experiment doesn’t resemble the fabled sea creature from Scotland, though they share a similar name).
The first phase of the experiment involves the gradual release of 6,600 gallons of a sodium hydroxide solution approximately 9.5 miles south of Nomans Land. The release would take about 90 minutes and then be monitored for up to five days.
The researchers hope to test the effectiveness of ocean alkalinity enhancement, or OAE, as a technique to increase the ocean’s natural ability to remove carbon from the atmosphere.
The ocean naturally absorbs about 30 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions from the atmosphere, but WHOI has suggested that adding a base, in this case sodium hydroxide, to the surface of the water would speed up that process. The carbon would then be stored in the ocean.
The compound proposed to be dumped off Nomans is a water-diluted solution where 50 percent is sodium hydroxide; it is simultaneously dispersed with another water-diluted solution that is 3 percent Rhodamine WT, a pink or dark red dye used to track movement. The alkalinity would be dispersed in a 250-meter radius circle.
The scientists would be able to measure changes in pH, alkalinity, and dissolved carbon for around 36 to 48 hours and follow the dye patch for a little longer. The team previously tested the effectiveness of the dye tracer to label a patch of water in August 2023.
If the initial leg of the experiment goes well, Phase 2 would take place next summer in the Wilkinson Basin, Gulf of Maine, 38 miles northeast of Cape Cod’s nearest shoreline. This stage would involve 66,000 gallons of sodium hydroxide disseminated for three to six hours and monitored for about 14 days.
The EPA doesn’t expect the experiment to cause any unacceptable adverse impacts of human health, the marine environment, or other uses of the ocean. “Upon review of the complete permit application for Phase 1, the EPA tentatively finds that the scientific merit of the proposed Phase 1 activities outweighs the potential environmental or other damage that may result from the activities,” the agency wrote. The same is true for Phase 2.
These research permits are tentatively supported by the EPA in accordance with the Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act, which regulates the intentional disposal of material into ocean waters.
The agency accepted public comments for consideration from May 30 until July 11.
Both individuals and groups submitted 80 comments to the agency. Many wrote in criticizing the experiment.
Environmental and a commercial fishing group have attempted to dissuade approval by the federal agency because they fear long-term impacts to the ocean ecology and doubt this experiment could lead to larger-scale climate change mitigation.
“I get it. People have been burned before…the oceans have been beat up. Caution is great,” Peter Raymond, Yale School of Environment professor and senior associate dean, said about pushback to these types of experiments. But for Raymond, the criticism isn’t “well-focused,” he said. He has trained as an oceanographer and studies the carbon cycle; he also has an interest in testing carbon-removing technologies.
Twenty years ago, most scientists weren’t fully engaged on natural climate solutions or carbon dioxide removal technology because the principal goal was to cut emissions, Raymond said. But about two or three years ago, that sentiment changed.
The message from the economists and policy makers shifted from the idea that carbon-removing technology would stray focus from cutting emissions to the understanding that both must happen. “Not only do we have to cut emissions, we have to actively remove [carbon dioxide] from the atmosphere in order to not enter catastrophic warming,” Raymond said.
Raymond is often part of larger discussions on whether or not marine carbon dioxide removal technologies can be safely scaled up sans human health and environmental impacts.
“These technologies need these initial experiments to determine their efficacy, if it’s even worth having those broader discussions, or do we have to think of other technologies,” he said.
“Our oceans in this region are warming faster than almost everywhere else on the planet,” Jennie Rheuban, research specialist of marine chemistry and geochemistry at WHOI and a co-principal investigator on the LOC-NESS project, said. “It’s not enough at this point to stop emitting carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.”
Ocean alkalinity enhancement is one of many strategies to remove carbon from the atmosphere, but Rheuban emphasized that the project isn’t endorsing this tactic.
“This is a research project designed to investigate the efficacy at how well does this strategy remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but also what are the potential environmental impacts of this work,” she said.
The flip side of increasing ocean storage of carbon is that when the ocean absorbs the gas, a type of acid forms that causes the waters to become more acidic, also known as ocean acidification. Ocean acidification has led to numerous issues, including softer clam shells. Rheuban argues, however, that OAE can help mitigate ocean acidification by raising the pH level. “It’s essentially turning back the clock of acidification,” she said.
But some don’t think the experiment is worth the risk.
“These experiments pose a significant threat to marine life, including endangered species. Further, they lack scientific merit, fail to consider a full life cycle assessment of environmental impacts, and are devoid of a plausible path for scale-up that is humane and safe,” Benjamin Day, senior campaigner for the Friends of the Earth U.S. nonprofit, wrote to the EPA.
Many commenters apart from Day were also concerned about the effect on marine life.
Sodium hydroxide can be dangerous to humans and animals; it’s actually caustic at a high concentration.
There are also innocuous uses for sodium hydroxide, however. Tisbury Water Works, for example, uses sodium hydroxide at 13 ppm to raise the pH of the town’s drinking water from about 6.5 to 7.5. It makes the water less acidic and safer to drink.
“It’s not harmful if you use it as a pH balancer,” James Cleary, Tisbury Water Works superintendent, said.
In this experiment, researchers estimate that within one minute after dispersal, sodium hydroxide would be 21 ppm, and then 9 ppm after the first hour.
Sodium hydroxide isn’t the only substance that can be used for ocean alkalinity enhancement. Other businesses and entities are also testing magnesium hydroxide and alkaline sand. Sodium hydroxide was chosen for this project because the material has very limited concentrations of other metals. The high purity ensures safety is maximized, Rheuban said.
The institute’s project designed and engineered the dispersal of sodium hydroxide so that the base dilutes rapidly and is within safe drinking water standards within a matter of minutes, Rheuban said. They expect pH levels to be below nine within about 30 seconds to a minute, she said, and that there would be a very limited environmental impact.
The EPA’s Water Quality Criteria for Aquatic Life in open ocean waters does state that pH shouldn’t change more than 0.2 units from natural variation, which would occur in this experiment.
“Initially, the pH will be significantly higher than 0.2 units outside the naturally occurring variation in pH. However, this feature will quickly be diluted on the timescale of hours to days back to baseline variation,” the proposal states.
Still, Day said organisms exposed to higher pH levels in that time period in the dispersal’s path could be permanently harmful or lethal.
And these waters are home to at least eight endangered species, as noted by others that submitted public comments to the EPA.
“These regions are important for commercial and recreational fishing because they are spawning grounds for commercially and recreationally important species, and provide habitat for many resident and migratory fish, invertebrates, sea turtles, and marine mammals,” Corrin Flora, marine resource management coordinator for the Maine Department of Marine Resources, told The Times. “In addition, the Phase 1 area is an important North Atlantic right whale habitat.”
The project, as per EPA permit requirements, guarantees a marine mammals observer on board for the dispersal. If there’s a documented marine mammal or school of fish nearby, the observer can shut down the experiment immediately.
Some critics argued that an observer wouldn’t be able to see animals below, but because the experiment takes place on the surface as OAE has to interact with the atmosphere to be effective, Rheuban said they don’t pose as much of a risk.
Regardless, there “is no guarantee that upon seeing a marine mammal, the observer could stop the experiment in time to prevent the creature from coming into direct contact with the chemical,” Day said in his comment to the EPA.
The Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association also fears for the long-term implications of the projects on commercial lobstermen, which are already “under siege” from offshore wind, increased predations, and settlement decline, they said. Association executive director Beth Casoni worries about increased carbon stored in the ocean and how alkaline might impact commercial fishermen “in ways we will not even know of until [it’s] already done,” she wrote to the EPA.
The department of marine resources for Maine and others don’t see how researchers have the ability to measure impacts as well.
Though Rhueban said that they can measure how much carbon dioxide goes from the atmosphere into the ocean, measuring the storage of the carbon for a long period of time is much more challenging.
The carbon storage signal is going to be small because of rapid dilution, but measurable, she said.
This is what worries the department. The project goals don’t seem achievable while maintaining water quality for marine life with quick dilution. Should future projects be scaled up — which it would need to do to have an impact on climate change — they’d need to cover larger regions of the ocean.
In their statement to the EPA, the department cautioned the agency against setting a precedent that could “impact already impaired ocean communities and economically important species populations.”
Other comments agreed that they couldn’t see how the experiment could be scaled up safely.
Rheuban addressed these concerns, emphasizing that this project is designed to be phased. “The goal of the LOC-NESS project is to test the efficacy,” she said. “How good is this technique at actually removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere? And what are the environmental impacts of that through our sampling? And then also, what are the tools that are actually needed to verify that carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere and stored reliably in the ocean for longer periods of time?”
“The next step in the phase of this research is to try to actually do this at a small enough scale, but out in the field,” she added. “Part of this work is to essentially throw the entire kitchen sink at the sampling and the monitoring for this experiment, to try to evaluate what are the best tools to do that…both from the perspective of the environmental impacts, but also from a carbon perspective.”
But environmentalists are weary. “If these experiments cannot be safely scaled up, it calls into question the value of measuring alkalinity dispersion and impacts on one particular patch of ocean at all,” Day wrote.
Rheuban also noted that some critics have questioned the material’s life cycle analysis, carbon emissions needed to produce and transport sodium hydroxide. But that isn’t the purpose of this work, she said.
Day disagrees that if the project hopes to bring about a reduction of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, then carbon emissions caused by the supply chain, transportation, and deployment of sodium hydroxide should be measured.
But to Rheuban, that’s not critical at this stage. “The goal is really to try to provide concrete, independent scientific information for managers and regulators to be able to make decisions as to whether or not ocean alkalinity enhancement as a strategy should be pursued,” she said.
The project is tentatively supported by the EPA in their permitting process but is awaiting final determination pending an analysis of public comments and reviews from other agencies, such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Phase 1 of the experiment was proposed to take place between August 2 and 12, but after the EPA extended the comment period for the permit application from July 1 to July 11, WHOI had to shift back their proposed start date.
“While EPA intends to follow the process under the Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act — implementing regulations as expeditiously as possible — the agency does not have a specific date by when final determinations will be made,” a spokesperson from the media relations office told The Times Monday.
Please, no more experiments for awhile, especially when the headline says “experiment”
It’s bad that many of the OSW projects are dumping 8 million gallons of 90 degree chlorinated sea water back in ocean daily to cool during the inversion process.
https://www.boem.gov/renewable-energy/state-activities/hvdc-cooling-systems-white-paper
Agreed! Let’s hold of on any more experiments in the ocean. At least until we clean the failures up first.
Lye is an experiment to clean up the failures.
Lots of lye, lots of lies.
John, whose lies? The oil industry lies?
Jason, how about we do research that is desperately needed?
Jason– thanks for posting the link.
Very interesting.
But have you noticed that virtually every large scale
power plant is located near a large body of water ?
In terms of waste heat being dumped into
coastal waterways, I would assume that burning
fossil fuels or creating a nuclear reaction would
likely produce considerably more waste heat than
would be generated by wind turbines. All that heat generated by
the friction is likely
constant across all generating systems.
I would assume that windfarms likely have a much lower
waste heat to kwh generated ratio than nukes or any
fossil fuel plant.
Lets have the researchers lay in a a bath of Lye and see how they like it
Lets have Brian lay in a bath of hydrocarbons and see if he likes it.
I put this kind of stuff n my tropical fish tank.
The fish don’t seem to mind.
of course, I wouldn’t fill up my entire tank with this
and then expect the fish to survive.
Let’s not be silly here.
This idea is almost as absurd as when back in the ’70’s scientists were proposing to cover the artic with ash to offset global cooling! Not old enough to remember the Global Cooling fad, check this out.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/zyhaxk/this_clip_from_1978_warning_of_an_impending_ice/?rdt=33042
John, I’m not familiar with your scientific credentials, would you mind sharing?
Mary, Axel doesnt have to be a scientist to tell you of articles in the 70’s about global cooling. Why the attack?
John (and Andrew), seriously curious about your credentials, it seemed to me like you have knowledge that others of us don’t have.
It wasn’t meant to be an attack. So sorry that it came across that way. 😔
Ms Hansen I dont know how old you are but I am 80 and I lived through that time and read all the articles. It has nothing to do with credentials but here they are. Lived in 11 countries, visited 100, undergraduate, graduate and Harvard Business School and CEO of Fortune 500 business. Soviet Refugee and three years in a Refugee Camp. I know a few things.
Reddit.
The God’s honest truth.
You can always find what you want to be true in Reddit.
Andrew, thanks for sharing your experience. I’m stunned that with your experience you would back conservative politics today, leading into a fascist future.
What could go wrong ?
Somehow, having lye added to the waters where the fish I consume and the marine mammals I revere live in seems like a really, really bad idea. I’m all for less chemical additives, not more, anywhere on the planet.
Where do these (mad) scientists come up with these schemes? Obviously taxpayer funded, this needs to be shut down before it gets legs! What madness is it to dump chemicals into our ocean? Must be too much weed at the dispensary! The leader of this project should be FIRED for wasting the taxpayers money!
Paul, we use chemicals all day long. Alkaline has legitimate uses, such as using wood ashes in the garden or treating your drinking water. 💦
Hey, plunge your hand into a vat of lye if that is what you want to do.
It might be a useful experiment.
Shut down WHOI?
What madness is it to dump chemicals on our farm fields?
This 8s a very important and legitimate question. What type of lye?
Food grade.
Drain cleaner.
Corpse disposal-Leonarda Cianciulli
Anyone else beginning to feel like a Guinea pig to these climate activists? They are all willing to endanger our waterways, sea life and fishing industry to prove a point. Why don’t these activists from the government and other countries try these chemical and wind farm alternatives in their own backyards. Please leave us alone.
Jean, since you already drink the chemicals, we probably won’t endanger any sea animals by doing research.
Wake up and read more about this as they admit, they’re probably going to kill fish in the process. But for the better good, let’s kill some more fish.
Bob– Who “admits” “they’re probably going to kill fish in the process” ?
Could you tell us who “they” are ? I don’t see that in this article.
Perhaps you are parroting Mr. Day’s opinion. If that’s the
case I guess you think “they” is non-binary and are respecting
their request that people use the correct pronoun when referring
to them. Good for you– congratulations on becoming woke.
I’m proud of you !!!!
OR–Perhaps you read that on a little slip of paper that
comes inside a fortune cookie. More likely though, you want to
think that “they” admit it so strongly that you just simply
make it up, and hope that some readers here are gullible
enough to believe it.
That kind of telling of “tall tales” and completely made up stuff
seems to work for a certain large orange blob of
lard with a large mouth, But please, is there
no sense that honesty has any value whatsoever ?
But you can clap back at me, and show me something
verifiable where the people who are conducting this
experiment “admit” it will probably kill fish.
I haven’t bothered to take the time to scour the internet
to verify what I think can’t be verified.
But I hope you do. I know you will feel very proud of yourself
if you are actually correct.
But no one is admitting anything of the sort
in this article.
Good luck.
Jean– The second paragraph of this article says
it is being conducted by The Woods Hole Oceanographic
institute (WHOI). As the name implies, it is in
Woods Hole– the town our ferry goes in and out of.
Many of the buildings that you see as you come into Woods
Hole are associated with WHOI.
Now I know it’s a popular knee jerk reaction to say NIMBY
and tell then to do it “in their own backyards” anytime anyone
tries anything. But in this case, the only way this stupid
experiment could get closer to WHOI’s backyard would be to
do it in Vineyard sound. , which is even closer to The Vineyard
than the current location. And while I am talking about the usual
retorts from the NIMBY’s, there is nothing in this article that
says anything about :other countries”. And no, the power from Vineyard
Wind is not going to New York.
We can have a more rational discussion than “NIMBY” and blame “other countries”
that have nothing to do with this.
We can just say it’s a stupid idea, for instance.
I think it’s stupid– it seems most people here think it’s stupid, and that’s
probably because it is stupid.
But it’s being done by our country in the backyard of the experimenters.
Just in case you didn’t read the whole article, here’s an excerpt:
“There are also innocuous uses for sodium hydroxide, however. Tisbury Water Works, for example, uses sodium hydroxide at 13 ppm to raise the pH of the town’s drinking water from about 6.5 to 7.5. It makes the water less acidic and safer to drink.
“It’s not harmful if you use it as a pH balancer,” James Cleary, Tisbury Water Works superintendent, said.”
All kinds of substances are dangerous at high levels and beneficial at low levels. Sugar, coffee, and chocolate, for example.
And, there are many instances where we ignore what’s in the water even if it’s gross (has anyone ever been swimming in a pool?! 🤣🤣🤣)
Can we please allow the professionals to do their jobs and not play “armchair scientists” when we have no training whatsoever in the science field?
WHOI, you have my full support for these tests!
Good luck! 🍀
Mary– I think it’s pretty well established that putting lye in water
makes it less acidic. Indeed, the acidity of the oceans has been increasing
due to the increased amount of co 2 it is absorbing.
The reason I am not really applauding this experiment is that regardless
of their findings, it is not scalable on a level that would actually result in any
measurable PH increase.
There is also the unintended consequences scenario.
The thing I worry about most with climate change is that when things get
so bad that even the idiot deniers’ realize what we have done, they will
propose simplistic idiotic solutions — remember they are idiots–
and could really screw things up in a hurry.
Having said that, I think the only damage that this particular
experiment could cause is to rally those opposed to anything but
burn oil and ignore the consequences to doubt the
credibility of WHOI.
And that is tragic.
This sort of thing has been around since the discovery that Co2 was a pollutant with the power to warm our planet uncontrollably. The first suggestion to solve the Co2 problem was by our scientists who proposed sprinkling the oceans with small pieces of aluminum reflectors to take advantage of a synthetioc albedo effect to cool our planet. It was seriously considered before they realized it was a ridiculous idea.
Frank, we need more ideas to cool the planet. My ideas are for every roof to be covered in solar panels and every family have a small wind turbine to generate electricity and leave the electric grid.
What are your ideas?
Mary…is your roof covered with solar panels? Do you have a windmill in your yard? Do you drive only an EV? Do you eat only organic food that you grow yourself and use completely fossil fuel free fertilizer? Are you completely off the grid…just asking for a friend.
No, we don’t need to come up with more Rube Goldberg ideas to “cool the planet.”
What is your training and professional experience?
Katherine,
By far the best comment. Succinct to the point with a dash of humor!
The vast amount science is pursuing what may be ridiculous ideas.
You don’t know until you try.
Ever heard of the precautionary principle?
Try out your ridiculous ideas in a lab, not in Earth’s commons.
WHOI used to be a very respectable institution, they lost credibility when They went to Antarctica to get ice samples at a time when Vineyard Wind was bulldozing ahead with its wind farm, with multiple concerns at that time and all we got was crickets. Looks like they took a Disney cruise by Vineyard wind to the Antarctica to get out of the way for Vineyard Wind.
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