NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA SPRUCE (Sustainably-powered Planetary RejUvenation via Carbon Entrapment) Exploring direct greenhouse gas removal via intelligent, airborne systems By Dr. Pankaj Dhussa

1. SPRUCE (Sustainably-powered Planetary RejUvenation via Carbon Entrapment)
Exploring direct greenhouse gas removal via intelligent, airborne systems
Challenge
• The leadingdriverof climatechangeis humanactivitygenerating
growinglevels of CO2 and CH4 in the atmosphere.In 2016, aviation
was responsiblefor 2.5% of globalCO2 emissions
• Rapidlydeterioratingclimatetrendsare due to anthropogenic
greenhousegases (GHG) and projectedextremereleaseof
methanefrom naturalsources (e.g., meltingpermafrostandfrom
beneaththe seafloor)
Expected Impacts
•Exploring direct greenhouse gas removal via intelligent,
airborne systems
•GHG-tailored artificial photosynthesis
Partners and/or Participants
• Department of Energy
Proposed Solutions
• Leverage artificial photosynthesis, a chemical process that biomimics
photosynthesis to convert sunlight, water, and CO2 to value added
products.
• Benefits of airborne cleanup approach (Fig 3) compared to SOA (Fig 2):
• Dynamic: No expensive ground installations; no cost of dismantling; in
place on time. Can be black boxed and installed onto many vehicle types
• Versatile: Handles a broad range of emitters, human-made and natural;
operates at optimal proximity; autonomous system accommodates state-
of-the-art components
Results
• Provided an effective SME-directed pathway for identification of high-value
Opportunities, and cross-disciplinary research
• The most effective way to mitigate GHG is to prevent emissions via persistent
monitoring and localization
Lyndsey McMillon-Brown