Synthetic Trees, Clean Air

In humanity’s quest for instant gratification and ready remedies for its consequences, a new contender has been born. Synthetic trees are in the works to battle climate change, and last month, Columbia University professor Klaus Lackner met with US Energy Secretary Steven Chu to discuss the project. Renderings of the synthetic tree show that the creation will look nothing like an actual tree but will just perform the same function as one, only better—the synthetic tree will gather 1000 times the carbon of a traditional tree and could potentially collect 90,000 tons of carbon per year. Now, that would almost be as good for the environment as switching to a plant-based diet. Almost.