Carbon Gap

Fossil emissions should not be offset by planting trees. Why? Let's take a look at the carbon cycle. ♻ In the short carbon cycle (through living organisms) carbon is only stored for a few decades. In the long carbon cycle (volcanoes, weathering etc.) carbon can be stored for millennia. Removing carbon that was emitted from the long carbon cycle (i.e. fossil fuels) and storing it in the short carbon cycle (i.e. organisms) leads to an unbalanced carbon cycle. 🪨 If the emissions came from the geosphere (e.g. fossil emissions) they should be removed and returned to the geosphere through processes like enhanced rock weathering, DACCS, DOCCS, BECCS, etc. 🌳 If the emissions come from the biosphere (e.g. land-use change, agricultural emissions) then they should be removed and returned to the biosphere through processes like reforestation, soil carbon, blue carbon etc. ⚖ We call this the like-for-like principle and it is integral to creating effective carbon removal policies. #InfoFriday #carbonremoval

Carbon removals should only be used to balance hard-to-abate emissions. Yet currently there is no strict definition for hard-to-abate. As technologies evolve, some emissions will become easier to abate than others and emissions will need to be re-classified if they are to be balanced with carbon removal. Based on the most ambitious scenarios, countries will have varying emissions per sector by 2050👇 which further complicates the question of what constitutes hard-to-abate. ✨ 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐄𝐔 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐚 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐜𝐥𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐟𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐚 𝐫𝐞𝐠𝐮𝐥𝐚𝐫 𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐢𝐬 𝐛𝐲 𝐞𝐦𝐩𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐧 𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐞 𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐭 𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐦𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬. We take a deep-dive in how to strengthen net zero claims here 🔎 https://lnkd.in/eZsrqsG9 #carbonremoval #greenclaims #netzero

Y en España, qué está pasando? Spain's current climate ambitions include a 90% cut in CO2 emissions based on 1990 levels. Nature-based carbon removal is seen as its main ticket for getting there, but other technologies such as bio-energy with carbon capture and storage and enhanced rock weathering may also play a role. Léalo todo aqui 👉 https://lnkd.in/e7F5AMfr #trackertuesday #carbonremoval

🌱 Soil carbon has an immense potential for #carbonremoval along with the many co-benefits involved in sustainable farming practices. To achieve a safe and just transition toward climate-friendly farming, any future policies must safeguard farmer autonomy and freedoms, as well as acknowledge the different stakeholders and their varying levels of responsibility and capacity to make significant changes. Doing so can help policymakers craft legislative frameworks that go beyond soil health thresholds to incentivise farmers to increase soil carbon stocks. 📈 More on what a safe, effective and just soil carbon governance looks like can be found here 👉 https://lnkd.in/e2ar6PbC #RecomMonday #soilcarbon #climateaction

🌡️ Celcius, Farenheit, Euros or Dollars? We dipped our toes in the Atlantic waters and took the temperature of carbon removal (CDR) innovation funding on both banks. 💸 Below is an EU-USA comparison of current spending and estimated funding needs for research, development and innovation (RD&I) on CDR. The figure shows current volumes of RD&I funding disbursed to CDR in the EU and the USA (filled bars) compared to estimated requirements to address pending research gaps over 20 years. For more context, read Chapter 1 of our proposed CDR strategy for Europe: https://lnkd.in/eAJHeU_r And for more on EU-USA policy comparisons, head over to our Policy Tracker: https://lnkd.in/ehNvV655 #PolicyTracker #CDR #InfoFriday

🤔 Imagine if the richest companies used their profits to finance carbon removal? It could lead to generating over ✨ 27 billion USD ✨ in climate finance yearly if just 141 high-profit companies spent 100 USD per ton they emit, representing a small percentage of profits. Instead of the producer-pays principle, we propose financing carbon removal in accordance with a company's "ability to pay", based on its profits per ton emitted, and the internal investment needed to reduce its own emissions. Unsurprisingly, those companies that emit the most can afford to pay the least for carbon removal. By looking at some of the largest companies' profits per tonne CO2 across a variety of sectors, we noticed that those companies with the highest profits and the lowest emissions were the most able to pay for carbon removal. Yet the ability to pay for carbon removal did not match their willingness to do so, creating a gap between ambition and capacity. 👉 𝐓𝐨 𝐛𝐫𝐢𝐝𝐠𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐚𝐦𝐛𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐠𝐚𝐩, 𝐰𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐫𝐨𝐛𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬 𝐯𝐨𝐥𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐨 𝐩𝐮𝐬𝐡 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐲𝐨𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 𝐜𝐮𝐫𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬. For a full read of our analysis, see here 👀 https://lnkd.in/eh5PZnQq #carbonremoval #climatefinance #cdr

A tale of two summaries: with summer under way, we give you a summary of the some of the key #carbonremoval news last month. Included in that recap is Carbon Gap's unattributed summary of discussions co-held with PIK - Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research on shaping the role of CDR in the EU Green Deal and an overview of the State of CDR in Europe. 👀 We give you a full recap of July in our recent newsletter: https://lnkd.in/epee2Z27 👉 Want to sign up? https://lnkd.in/e_GPWV_q Find more information on each news item: N: https://lnkd.in/e6DB_MNA E: https://lnkd.in/enbEdhUi W: https://lnkd.in/ek_XuhCd S: https://lnkd.in/dauWHZ9R and https://lnkd.in/emcnDFEU 🙌 Shout out to European Climate Neutrality Observatory (ECNO), 1PointFive, The OpenAir Collective, Malin Dufour, Kenneth Möllersten, Lars Zetterberg, Benjamin Sovacool, Chad M. Baum, Livia Fritz, Ben Caldecott, Injy Johnstone for their contributions to CDR news this week!

📜 Cyprus has yet to integrate carbon removal (CDR) in its plan to reach climate neutrality by 2050. Would you like to know more about the CDR policy situation on the island? 🏃 Head over to our Policy Tracker entry: https://lnkd.in/en_NR9vi #TrackerTuesday #CDR #Cyprus

To reach its climate goals, the EU will need to implement deployment incentives to boost the availability of carbon removal. For today's #RecomMonday, we have a simple recipe the EU can use 🍴 🥒 Gather the ingredients necessary to craft and launch a pilot procurement programme 🥘 Once the programme has successfully simmered, mix in public and private funding and bring to a boil 🍲 Add a Carbon Clearing-house to the medley and watch as CDR scales up! To read our full recommendations, see here: https://lnkd.in/eAJHeU_r #carbonremoval #deploymentincentives

🛣️ Veien til netto nullutslipp er lang, men vi har et kart! I sommer gjennomførte vi, med bidrag fra Carbon Limits AS og Perspectives Climate Group, en spørreundersøkelse blant interessenter innen karbonfjerning (vanligvis forkortet CDR) for å finne ut hvordan vi konkret kan støtte utrullingen av CDR i Norge. 🗺️ Sjekk ut hele rapporten og veikartet her: https://lnkd.in/eyEpx-Yh #CDR #Norway #PolicyThursday