If there’s to be any hope of halting global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius this century, it will require a mammoth scaling up of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) technologies to vacuum up billions of tons of the stuff from the atmosphere.
But removal efforts to date have largely focused on natural climate solutions like reforestation or storing carbon dioxide in soil. To avoid the worst of a warming planet, engineered approaches that include sucking the emissions directly from the atmosphere must increase by a factor of at least 30 by 2030 and 1,300 by mid-century, researchers from a coalition including the University of Oxford and the German Institute for International and Security Affairs said in a report Thursday.
"We find a gap between how much CDR countries are planning and what is needed in scenarios to meet the Paris temperature goal,’’ the authors wrote. "There are currently few plans by countries to scale CDR above current levels, exposing a substantial shortfall.’’
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