How will sequestered carbon dioxide gas affect ocean life?
—Submitted by 4th through 6th grade students participating in Birch Aquarium at Scripps’ Summer Learning Adventures program. ACarbon dioxide will not affect ocean life while it remains trapped well below the sea floor, and there are few worries that the gas will escape in large quantities. The Utsira formation, a layer of sandstone in the North Sea about 1 kilometer (0.62 miles) below the sea bed where this CO2 is currently being stored, is thought by scientists to be very suitable because of the dense rock layer that is on top of the formation. Estimates for the likely leakage rate are very low – less than 1 percent over 1,000 years.
