The geopolitics of negative emissions technologies: learning lessons from REDD+ and renewable energy for afforestation, BECCS, and direct air capture

Abstract

Negative emissions technologies (NETs) have received increasing interest in recent years as a potential part of a portfolio of measures to address anthropogenic climate change, in particular following the 2015 UNFCCC Paris Agreement and the 2018 IPCC Special Report 'Global Warming of 1.5°C'. This increasing significance for global climate policy is faced with a multitude of open questions regarding, among others, the geopolitical implications of largescale use of NETs. This paper outlines what we can learn for the possible geopolitical futures of NETs from existing international 'green' approaches.

Public perceptions on carbon removal from focus groups in 22 countries

“…Mining requirements, the capacity for waste materials to substitute for new mining activities, and (international) transportation and supply chain logistics, are undergoing early assessments; each may undercut carbon drawdown 68 . The geopolitics of these logistics are even less parsed 69 . However, given the relevance of the agricultural sector and food security in making sense of most carbon removal proposals, investigations on EW as a fertilizer replacement and co-benefits for food production may prove influential – particularly in the global South 70 .…”

Responsible innovation in CDR: designing sustainable national Greenhouse Gas Removal policies in a fragmented and polycentric governance system

“…Some recent studies explore the fit of specific CDR techniques with the priorities and capabilities of sub-national levels of government, as in Wedding et al's (2021) analysis of the potential role of blue carbon in California's climate strategy. In some valuable cases, new or speculative forms of CDR are placed in the context of longer historical experiences of carbon sequestration and removal (Carton et al, 2020;Kreuter and Lederer, 2021).…”