CO2 Removal 'No Silver Bullet' to Fighting Climate Change-Scientists

Technologies to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to help tackle global warming only have limited potential and more effort should be made to reduce emissions, European scientists said in a report on Wednesday.

Proposals to use climate technologies, ranging from spraying sun-dimming chemicals high above the Earth to capturing and storing carbon dioxide underground, have been gaining more attention as the urgency to act on climate change mounts.

Under the 2015 Paris Agreement, world governments have agreed to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels but a large gap remains between countries’ emissions plans and the reductions needed.

The European Academies’ Science Advisory Council (EASAC), formed from national science academies of EU members, has reviewed scientific evidence about several options for removing carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere with so-called negative emission technologies.

Examples of such technologies include the direct capture of CO2 and trapping it underground (carbon capture and storage); afforestation and reforestation; land management to increase and fix carbon in soils; and ocean fertilization.

The EASAC, which advises European policymakers, said these technologies have “limited realistic potential to remove carbon from the atmosphere” and not at the scale in some climate forecasts, such as several gigatons of carbon each year after 2050.

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