MIT engineers make converting CO2 into useful products more practical

> Yes, yes, I know, planting more trees won't do much about the greenhouse gas problem at scale, but the only thing that will are the three P's: powerdown, permaculture, population control. I do not expect industry to solve the problem industry created in a way that doesn't create more problems.

But I am always wondering: Couldn't we have planted forests, from which we take the grown trees and put them back down under the earth, in some old mining facilities or dig some tunnels that lead deep down and put that stuff there? Or perhaps build lots of long term use furniture from the trees? Anything, except burning them or letting them rod? Then we would use nature's mechanism for capturing and prevent releasing, by putting it deep down, or making meaningful long term use of it.

And couldn't this be done on a bigger scale as well?

> Couldn't we have planted forests, from which we take the grown trees and put them back down under the earth, in some old mining facilities or dig some tunnels that lead deep down and put that stuff there?

This is basically how coal was created in the first place.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_forest

Assuming carbon in = carbon out, we'd have to plant trees for millions of years on virtually all arable land and bury them underground to undo our burning of coal, since that's how the coal (which is almost pure carbon) was originally created.

The problem is we're putting millions of tons of carbon into the air every year and it takes a while for a freshly planted tree to reach a ton of carbon stored. So you would need to plant millions of trees per year and take care of them for years before you can chop them down and bury them.

Yes, you could grow and bury trees to reverse the carbon cycle. Even just leaving the trees standing is a pretty good carbon sink.

Housing is also a great carbon sink as the wood used in construction is protected from rotting.

So I guess it is simply too slow, or alternatively, we would all be busy in that business and not do anything else any longer?

Simpler: nobody will pay you to buy land, grow trees, and bury them. You will get paid for farming, logging, mining, drilling, and much more.