CFP's Katrin Sievert presented at the 2nd International Conference on Negative CO2 Emissions
The 2nd International Conference on Negative CO2 Emissions was held at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, Sweden, June 14-17, 2022. Katrin Sievert, one of the CFP PhD candidates, represented the group as well as the ISTP Carbon Removal Lab and presented preliminary insights on the cost of direct air capture.
The purpose of this conference series is to bring together a wide range of scientists, experts and stakeholders, in order to engage in various aspects of research relating to negative CO2 emissions. Research sessions focused on negative emission technologies (e.g., Technological solutions such as Direct Air Capture, nature-based solutions such as Enhanced weathering, as well as climate modeling, climate policies and incentives).
The conference chair, Anders Lyngfelt, delivered the opening keynote, focusing on how to deal with climate debt. "All scenarios to meet 1.5°C require gigantic negative emissions. We need to remove 800 GtCO2, which will probably cost €10,000 per capita. Who will bear the cost of these negative emissions?"
The question of how to finance CDR was also taken up by other speakers, such as Liv Lundberg, who summarized the options of tax credits (e.g. 45Q), inclusion in emissions trading (e.g. ETS), contract for difference, i.e. lump sum payments such as FITs, and presented a reverse auction mechanism that is being applied to BECCS in Sweden. In his keynote address on direct air capture, Mijndert van der Spek appealed, "We only have 1-2 investment cycles left until 2050. Everything we build now has to work in a net-zero society."
In summary, the mood could best be described as a sense of we need to do everything, i.e., reducing emissions in all sectors, removing CO2 by all available and (yet) undeveloped means, and tackling other greenhouse gas emissions (e.g. methane).
For more carbon removal content and recaps, follow external page@RobertHoglund on Twitter.