A recent publication, “The State of Carbon Dioxide Removal: A global independent scientific assessment,” a collaboration of research done in the United States, United Kingdom, and the Europe Union calls for the need to remove between 450 billion and 1,100 billion tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere by 2100 if we hope to keep mean global temperatures within the Paris Climate Agreement goal of 1.5 Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) or even 2.0 Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit).
How significant is the challenge? Currently, we remove 2 billion tons of CO2 from the atmosphere annually. Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) is accomplished largely through reforestation, forest maintenance, and soil carbonation, not from novel technologies such as Direct Air Capture (DAC) and Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) which currently only contribute 0.1% of total CDR annually. But short of cutting off all sources of CO2 emissions with the consequences that would entail, it is DAC and CCS that will likely when ramped up help us remove the 450 to 1,100 billion tons. This means we need to increase the deployment of CDR technology 1,300 times from where we are at present.