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Carbon dioxide removal ( CDR) is a process in which carbon dioxide () is removed from the atmosphere by deliberate human activities and durably stored in geological, terrestrial, or ocean reservoirs, or in products.IPCC, 2021: " Annex VII: Glossary". Matthews, J.B.R., V. Möller, R. van Diemen, J.S. Fuglestvedt, V. Masson-Delmotte, C. Méndez, S. Semenov, A. Reisinger (eds.). In " Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change". Masson-Delmotte, V., P. Zhai, A. Pirani, S.L. Connors, C. Péan, S. Berger, N. Caud, Y. Chen, L. Goldfarb, M.I. Gomis, M. Huang, K. Leitzell, E. Lonnoy, J.B.R. Matthews, T.K. Maycock, T. Waterfield, O. Yelekçi, R. Yu, and B. Zhou (eds.). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA, pp. 2215–2256, This process is also known as carbon removal, greenhouse gas removal or negative emissions. CDR is more and more often integrated into climate policy, as an element of climate change mitigation strategies. Achieving net zero emissions will require first and foremost deep and sustained cuts in emissions, and then—in addition—the use of CDR ("CDR is what puts the net into net zero emissions" ). In the future, CDR may be able to counterbalance emissions that are technically difficult to eliminate, such as some agricultural and industrial emissions.M. Pathak, R. Slade, P.R. Shukla, J. Skea, R. Pichs-Madruga, D. Ürge-Vorsatz,2022: Technical Summary. In: Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change. Contribution of Working Group III to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change P.R.. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY, USA. doi: 10.1017/9781009157926.002.
CDR includes methods that are implemented on land or in aquatic systems. Land-based methods include afforestation, reforestation, agricultural practices that sequester carbon in soils (carbon farming), bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS), and direct air capture combined with storage. There are also CDR methods that use oceans and other water bodies. Those are called ocean fertilization, ocean alkalinity enhancement, wetland restoration and blue carbon approaches. A detailed analysis needs to be performed to assess how much negative emissions a particular process achieves. This analysis includes life cycle analysis and "monitoring, reporting, and verification" () of the entire process. Carbon capture and storage (CCS) are not regarded as CDR because CCS does not reduce the amount of carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere.
As of 2023, CDR is estimated to remove around 2 gigatons of per year. This is equivalent to about 4% of the emitted per year by human activities. There is potential to remove and sequester up to 10 gigatons of carbon dioxide per year by using those CDR methods which can be safely and economically deployed now.Engineering National Academies of Sciences (2018). 9780309484527, National Academies Press. . ISBN 9780309484527 However, quantifying the exact amount of carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere by CDR is difficult.
Synonyms for CDR include greenhouse gas removal (GGR), negative emissions technology, and carbon removal. Technologies have been proposed for removing non- greenhouse gases such as methane from the atmosphere, but only carbon dioxide is currently feasible to remove at scale. Therefore, in most contexts, greenhouse gas removal means carbon dioxide removal.
The term geoengineering (or climate engineering) is sometimes used in the scientific literature for both CDR or SRM (solar radiation management), if the techniques are used at a global scale.IPCC (2022) Chapter 1: Introduction and Framing in Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change. Contribution of Working Group III to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA The terms geoengineering or climate engineering are no longer used in IPCC reports.
After net zero emissions have been achieved, CDR could be used to reduce atmospheric concentrations, which could partially reverse the warming that has already occurred by that date. All emission pathways that limit global warming to 1.5 °C or 2 °C by the year 2100 assume the use of CDR in combination with emission reductions.
Rogelj, J., D. Shindell, K. Jiang, S. Fifita, P. Forster, V. Ginzburg, C. Handa, H. Kheshgi, S. Kobayashi, E. Kriegler, L. Mundaca, R. Séférian, and M.V.Vilariño, 2018: Chapter 2: Mitigation Pathways Compatible with 1.5 °C in the Context of Sustainable Development. In: Global Warming of 1.5 °C. An IPCC Special Report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty Masson-Delmotte,. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY, USA, pp. 93-174.
Reliance on large-scale deployment of CDR was regarded in 2018 as a "major risk" to achieving the goal of less than 1.5 °C of warming, given the uncertainties in how quickly CDR can be deployed at scale. Strategies for mitigating climate change that rely less on CDR and more on sustainable use of energy carry less of this risk.
The possibility of large-scale future CDR deployment has been described as a moral hazard, as it could lead to a reduction in near-term efforts to mitigate climate change. However, the 2019 NASEM report concludes: "Any argument to delay mitigation efforts because NETs will provide a backstop drastically misrepresents their current capacities and the likely pace of research progress."
CDR is meant to complement efforts in hard-to-abate sectors rather than replace mitigation. Limiting climate change to 1.5 °C and achieving net-zero emissions would entail substantial carbon dioxide removal (CDR) from the atmosphere by the mid-century, but how much CDR is needed at country level over time is unclear. Equitable allocations of CDR, in many cases, exceed implied land and carbon storage capacities. Many countries have either insufficient land to contribute an equitable share of global CDR or insufficient geological storage capacity. Text was copied from this source, which is available under a
Experts also highlight social and ecological limits for carbon dioxide removal, such as the land area required. For example, the combined land requirements of removal plans as per the global Nationally Determined Contributions in 2023 amounted to 1.2 billion hectares, which is equal to the combined size of global croplands.
Biomass, such as trees, can be directly stored into the Earth's subsurface. Furthermore, carbon dioxide that has been removed from the atmosphere can be stored in the Earth's crust by injecting it into the subsurface, or in the form of insoluble carbonate salts. This is because they are removing carbon from the atmosphere and sequestering it indefinitely and presumably for a considerable duration (thousands to millions of years).
Some mitigation pathways propose achieving higher rates of CDR through massive deployment of one technology; however, these pathways assume that hundreds of millions of hectares of cropland are converted to growing biofuel crops. Further research in the areas of direct air capture, geologic sequestration of carbon dioxide, and carbon mineralization could potentially yield technological advancements that make higher rates of CDR economically feasible. Investing in nature-based solutions is considered a way to buy time for the advancement of engineered carbon removal methods, enabling their full deployment in the second half of the 21st century.
As trees grow they absorb from the atmosphere and store it in living biomass, dead organic matter and Soil carbon. Afforestation and reforestation – sometimes referred to collectively as 'forestation' – facilitate this process of carbon removal by establishing or re-establishing forest areas. It takes forests approximately 10 years to ramp- up to the maximum sequestration rate.
Depending on the species, the trees will reach maturity after around 20 to 100 years, after which they store carbon but do not actively remove it from the atmosphere. Text was copied from this source, which is available under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License Carbon can be stored in forests indefinitely, but the storage can also be much more short-lived as trees are vulnerable to being cut, burned, or killed by disease or drought. Once mature, forest products can be harvested and the biomass stored in long-lived wood products, or used for bioenergy or biochar. Consequent forest regrowth then allows continuing removal.
Risks to deployment of new forest include the availability of land, competition with other land uses, and the comparatively long time from planting to maturity.
Agricultural methods for carbon farming include adjusting how tillage and livestock grazing is done, using organic mulch or compost, working with biochar and terra preta, and changing the crop types. Methods used in forestry include for example reforestation and bamboo farming. Carbon farming is not without its challenges or disadvantages. This is because some of its methods can affect ecosystem services. For example, carbon farming could cause an increase of land clearing, and biodiversity loss.
Ocean alkalinity enhancement involves grinding, dispersing, and dissolving minerals such as olivine, limestone, silicates, or calcium hydroxide to precipitate carbonate sequestered as deposits on the ocean floor. The removal potential of alkalinity enhancement is uncertain, and estimated at between 0.1 and 1 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide per year at a cost of US$100 to $150 per tonne.
Electrochemical techniques such as electrodialysis can remove carbonate from seawater using electricity. While such techniques used in isolation are estimated to be able to remove 0.1 to 1 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide per year at a cost of US$150 to $2,500 per tonne, these methods are much less expensive when performed in conjunction with seawater processing such as desalination, where salt and carbonate are simultaneously removed. Preliminary estimates suggest that the cost of such carbon removal can be paid for in large part if not entirely from the sale of the desalinated water produced as a byproduct.
Although CDR is not covered by the EU Allowance as of 2021, the European Commission is preparing for carbon removal certification and considering carbon contracts for difference. CDR might also in future be added to the UK Emissions Trading Scheme. As of end 2021 carbon prices for both these cap-and-trade schemes currently based on carbon reductions, as opposed to carbon removals, remained below $100. After the diffusion of net-zero targets, CDR plays a more important role in key emerging economies (e.g. Brazil, China, and India).
As of early 2023, financing has fell short of the sums required for high-tech CDR methods to contribute significantly to climate change mitigation. Though available funds have recently increased substantially. Most of this increase has been from voluntary private sector initiatives. Such as a private sector alliance led by Stripe with prominent members including Meta Platforms, Google and Shopify, which in April 2022 revealed a nearly $1 billion fund to reward companies able to permanently capture & store carbon. According to senior Stripe employee Nan Ransohoff, the fund was "roughly 30 times the carbon-removal market that existed in 2021. But it's still 1,000 times short of the market we need by 2050." The predominance of private sector funding has raised concerns as historically, voluntary markets have proved "orders of magnitude" smaller than those brought about by government policy. As of 2023 however, various governments have increased their support for CDR; these include Sweden, Switzerland, and the US. Recent activity from the US government includes the June 2022 Notice of Intent to fund the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law's $3.5 billion CDR program, and the signing into law of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which contains the 45Q tax to enhance the CDR market.
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