Iron fertilization and global warming

ScienceDaily: Iron Critical To Ocean Productivity, Carbon Uptake

The story above notes:

A new study has found that large segments of the Pacific Ocean lack sufficient iron to trigger healthy phytoplankton growth and the absence of the mineral stresses these microscopic ocean plants, triggering them to produce additional pigments that make ocean productivity appear more robust than it really is.

As a result, past interpretations of satellite chlorophyll data may be inaccurate, the researchers say, and the tropical Pacific Ocean may photosynthesize 1-2 billion tons less atmospheric carbon dioxide than was previously thought. Global ocean carbon uptake is estimated at 50 billion tons, so the reduction in the estimate of the uptake is significant -- about 2 to 4 percent.

It doesn't talk directly about the idea of fertilizing the ocean with iron as a way of decreasing CO2 in the atmosphere, but surely this possible anti global warming method should start attracting more serious attention again soon.

I thought I mentioned this idea before here, but can't find the post now. Anyway, I have found a detailed Wikipedia entry about it which (while apparently written from the "pro" side) does explain some of the possible "cons" too.

Certainly sounds worth serious consideration (more so than shooting sulfur into the high atmosphere.)

UPDATE: Blogger search is obviously not working well at the moment, for some reason. Here's my earlier post where iron fertilization got a mention.