A Deliberative Orientation to Governing Carbon Dioxide Removal: Actionable Recommendations for National-Level Action

Abstract

Effective and legitimate governance of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) requires that the needs, interests, and perspectives of those liable to bear the burdens of CDR's effects be present in decision-making and oversight processes. This ideal has been widely recognized in prior academic work. How, though, in a practical sense, is this deliberative aspect of CDR governance to be understood? In this policy brief, we look at the future incorporation of carbon removal pledges into the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) of countries under the Paris Agreement, and we argue for and explore a deliberative orientation when it comes to the inclusion of CDR into country-level climate change response goals. The aim is to provide practical guidance on deliberation as a toolkit and set of practices.

The ABC of Governance Principles for Carbon Dioxide Removal Policy

“…Consequently, CDR has -in principle -been firmly situated in the realm of climate change mitigation policy. Yet -in practice -CDR is hardly mentioned in the nationally determined contributions (NDCs; see e.g., Borth and Nicholson, 2021), which are the backbone of mitigation action under the Paris Agreement (PA). This will have to change, if the proposed net-zero pledges and eventually the 2 • C -let alone the 1.5 • C -goals are to be achieved.…”

Guide to Best Practices in Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement Research

“…1. Overall, OAE and its nearest equivalents are seen as relatively less acceptable, more likely to invoke affectively negative feelings, or to be viewed as relatively more or most risky when compared to other carbon removal strategies (Cox et al, 2020;Jobin and Siegrist, 2020;Bertram and Merk, 2020;Shrum et al, 2020;.…”

“…Marine CDR has the potential to reduce the need for land and freshwater resources. Large-scale marine CDR approaches, however, may struggle to achieve public acceptance (Bertram and Merk, 2020;Nawaz et al, 2023). Marine CDR options are receiving more and more interest, acknowledging that the ocean has already absorbed more than a quarter of the anthropogenic CO 2 emissions and would, on timescales of thousands to hundreds of thousands of years, take up most of the remaining emissions (Archer and Brovkin, 2008), as it has done with natural high-CO 2 excursions in the Earth's geological past.…”

“…A possible advantage of most OAE methods is that, technologically, they appear relatively simple and rely, to a substantial degree, on technology that exists already for processing different mineral resources at annual rates similar to those that may be required by OAE by mid-century. A pos-sible roadblock for rapidly scaling up OAE may be a lack of public acceptance (Bertram and Merk, 2020;Nawaz et al, 2023).…”

Framework for Assessing the Feasibility of Carbon Dioxide Removal Options Within the National Context of Germany

“…There is the need for approaches that can help to elicit and synthesize knowledge on CDR options in a transparent, comprehensive, and inclusive manner in order to support participatory and deliberative processes for defining the governance of CDR within the national context (Borth and Nicholson, 2021). Lessons learned from the assessment of bioenergy options in Germany suggest that using indicators tailored to specific decision-making processes can enable codesign in collaboration with key stakeholder groups (e.g., Thrän et al, 2020).…”