S1E127: Every tool in the climate shed: How CO2 removal is a step towards net-zero

As more carbon dioxide accumulates in the atmosphere, the urgency
is growing for safe and sustainable methods to remove this main
greenhouse gas from the air to limit the impact of climate
change. 


Synopsis: Every first and third Sunday of the month, The Straits
Times analyses the beat of the changing environment, from
biodiversity conservation to climate change.


CO2 is the main greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. We can’t see
it, we can’t smell it but we can definitely feel its growing
impacts as the planet heats up with devastating consequences. And
every year, it keeps accumulating. 


Human activity is producing about 40 billion tonnes of CO2 a
year. That’s mainly from burning fossil fuels and
deforestation. 


To fight climate change, we not only need to slash CO2 emissions,
we would also need to remove billions of tonnes that our human
activities had earlier emitted into the atmosphere. 


And that means dramatically scaling up carbon dioxide removal
technologies. We’ll never reach the Paris Agreement’s climate
targets by 2050 unless we remove at least four times more CO2
from the atmosphere every year than we do at present.


That’s the conclusion of a major study on carbon dioxide removal
released in June 2024. 


So what exactly is carbon dioxide removal, or CDR? And what is
needed to really get investment pumping?


In this episode, ST's climate change editor David Fogarty hosts
one of the lead authors of the report, Gregory Nemet, a Professor
at the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s La Follette School of
Public Affairs in the United States.  Greg studies the
process of technological change and the ways in which public
policy can affect it.


Highlights of conversation (click/tap above):


1:44 How does carbon dioxide removal (CDR) help in the fight
against climate change?


3:12 The difference between CDR and carbon capture and storage
(CCS)


4:58 Main findings from the recently published global report on
CDR 


7:58 Examples of the different types of CDR 


11:43 What are the costs?


19:55 What are the environmental risks from CDR? How to ensure
scaled-up methods can be sustainable?


Produced by: David Fogarty (dfogarty@sph.com.sg), Ernest Luis
& Hadyu Rahim


Edited by: Hadyu Rahim


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