March 4, 2022

Negative Emissions Platform has developed a CDR Atlas, an interactive tool showcasing the growing number of companies and projects active in the field of atmospheric and biogenic carbon removal. The Atlas is an ongoing project that will be kept up to date with new announcements and additional information about projects as they evolve.

The last two years have witnessed an exciting increase in the pace and volume of developments in the carbon removal landscape. During this time we saw the role and importance of negative emissions solutions graduate from a mere "add on", for example, the lack of technological removals in National Energy and Climate Plans (NECP), to an essential element in achieving the 1.5˚C goal at all levels of sociaty. 

This shift in policy is evident in the European Commission's recent Sustainable Carbon Cycles Communication, a first strategy addressing the necessary scale-up of solutions that actively remove CO2 from the air. The communication states that "carbon removals will have to be increased and further integrated into EU climate policies," emphasising the Commission’s intention to "kick-start" and "upscale carbon removals across the EU." We also see a broadening of the list of potential solutions, from the usual suspects (DACS and BECCS) to include, for example, biochar (via PyCCS), enhanced weathering, waste-to-energy with CCS and carbon utilisation in construction materials. 

On the supply side, we saw an influx of innovative and exciting negative emissions solutions (think Mission Zero, Running Tide, Heirloom, Neustark…), some still need to be proven. Others, like Repair (with their fuel cell tech), took more mature technologies and methods and repurposed them to aid in the removal of CO2 from the air. At the same time deals were made, for example, Standard Gas raised £17.6 million in January 2022 and Carbo Culture raised $6,2 million in April 2021. Finally, Charm Industrial and Climeworks are examples of projects that evolved from small demonstration plants to full-scale operational projects that actively remove CO2 from the air and store it for a climate-relevant period. 

In parallel, a fundamental change in the voluntary carbon market has taken root. Early adopters like Stripe, Shopify, Swiss Re, Milkywire and BCG are demonstrating innovative and fresh approaches, prioritising impact over claims and acting as catalysts rather than passive consumers of credits. South Pole and Mitsubishi Corporation announce the development of a new facility to scale up carbon removal solutions. And let’s not forget about the $100 million carbon removal Xprize competition.

Marketplaces like Carbonfuture and Puro.earth saw increased demand for removal credits and in some cases, even sold out. Interest in marketplace actors was not limited to carbon removal credits. Carbonfuture closed multiple funding rounds, and Nasdaq bought a majority share in Puro.earth.

With the momentum obtained over the past two years and with negative emissions solutions poised to play a more central role in EU environmental policy, the time has come to take stock of the current state of play. 

To this end, Negative Emissions Platform has developed the CDR Atlas, an interactive tool that gathers and showcases projects and companies active in the field of atmospheric and biogenic carbon removal with durable to permanent storage. The Atlas forms part of an ongoing project, and we will keep it up to date with new announcements and additional information about projects as they evolve. 

View the CDR Atlas here.