At the end of his educational book, the chemist and biologist Bernhard Kegel formulates the book title as a question: “Save the world with plants?” Before this is provided, he looks at various possible measures with us in six chapters to2-Missions to reduce or to counter them. In an introduction, he explains what the weight of air is all about.
In order to penetrate deeper into the matter and the current state of research and the implementation of individual measures, Kegel gives us prior knowledge of fabric flows and cycles as well as the “air fertilizer”. This means carbon dioxide emissions that are “absorbed by the land masses and their vegetation”.
In the following he focuses on primarily biological options. In detail, he discusses the opportunities and risks of reforestation and rewetting that have dried up as carbon sinks. We look at blue carbon, sea meadows, algae and mangroves. After all, it is about the more efficient artificial photosynthesis for our concern and the controversial synthetic biology. Those who bring prior knowledge have an advantage here.
Bernhard Kegel criticizes the hesitation of politics, bureaucracy and the thoughts that everything must finally be researched before implementation. Conclusion of the illuminating and complex reading: it is complicated and sometimes sobering. Alexander Schramm
Bernhard Kegel
Save the world with plants
Green solutions to climate change
Dumont Verlag, 288 pages, € 25, –
ISBN 978-3-8321-6850-6