World’s capacity to capture carbon  — a crucial climate change mitigation action — is likely to increase sixfold by 2030! But is it enough?

Almost every single day, we hear about adopting electric vehicles, clean energy, planting trees, and decarbonising our industries as vital climate actions. But how do we deal with the relentless emissions we cannot entangle from our lives just yet?

Let's face it; as carbon-intensive as thermal power plants, cement manufacturing, and agriculture are, they are quintessential activities to survive in today's world and place a roof over our heads and food on our plates. Additionally, not everyone possesses the necessary capital and technology to decarbonise their economies within a short time span.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases accumulate in the atmosphere and trap heat. Therefore, it is only logical that we sequester these villainous compounds out of the atmosphere and lock them up somewhere secure. Oceans, forests, peatlands, healthy soil, and grasslands have been doing this free service (aka ecosystem service) for billions of years. But the rate of emissions from human activities in today's world is just too much for these natural processes to cope.

So, in recent decades, scientists have come up with means to do this artificially, except it comes with a costly catch!

Meet Carbon Capture — another climate ally!

This unbelievable technology is called 'Carbon Capture' (CC) — precisely what it sounds like, and usually, the gas is processed from point sources such as the chimneys of industrial power plants. So, no, we don't have to hire someone to frantically run around the city with the heavy equipment to suck the carbon out of it (although it is possible!).

Around 43 million tons of CO2, or 0.1% of global emissions, are being captured using CC today. Essentially, this approach extends the potential to turn power plants completely green!

However, as mentioned earlier, this technology has earned itself a bad rep because it is a bit too expensive and risky at the moment. As per estimates from the International Energy Agency, the cost of capturing carbon can vary greatly, from about ₹1,200 to ₹9,900 per tonne of CO2, based on where the technology is being applied. Some sources estimate that fitting power plants with CC tech can increase the plant's energy costs by 30-60%. Moreover, it also carries the risk of leaking into the atmosphere and amplifying climate change in future or polluting the nearby water supplies.

However, many assert that slapping a blatant price on such crucial processes is being tunnel-visioned out of the bigger, scarier picture. Some experts even argue that CC is integral to the net-zero goal and is the only way we can bring some "balance" to unavoidable emissions.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report also highlights the potential of CO2 capture and storage and expects that the costs can be decreased over time. "The importance of future capture and storage of CO2 for mitigating climate change will depend on a number of factors, including financial incentives provided for deployment and whether the risks of storage can be successfully managed," says the IPCC report.

Strides in Carbon Capture technology

Science doesn't stop, and neither has research in the CC sector. According to a report by BoombergNEF (BNEF), despite odds, the global capacity for CC will increase sixfold by 2030. While this only means an increase to 0.6% of total global emissions captured (279 million tons of CO2), this is already a 44% increase over what we expected last year!

Further, the BNEF report outlines that more and more industries are likely to use CC to sequester CO2 from the air. In 2021, a disproportionate amount of the CC capacity was used in natural gas processing plants (62%) since this was only the area where the tech was deemed viable.

However, strides in CC technology will also help clean up other sectors. The BNEF report projects that by 2030, power generation (to abate industrial emissions) will take up the largest share of CC capacity, followed by hydrogen-ammonia manufacturing industries. Natural gas processing plants will occupy only 21% of the total capacity in third place, which is a massive win for the technology's versatility!

"CC is starting to overcome its bad reputation," said David Lluis Madrid, lead author of the report. "It is now being deployed as a decarbonisation tool, which means the CO2 needs to be stored. A lack of CO2 transport and storage sites near industrial or power generation point sources could be a major bottleneck to CCS development. But we are already seeing a big increase in these projects to serve that need."

However, there is still a way to go. To make a dent in global emissions to reach 2050 warming targets, we need to sequester around one to two billion tons of CO2 by 2030, experts reckon. But with growing enthusiasm, support and funding (about Rs. 8,200 crores was invested in CC tech just this year alone), there is some light at the end of this dusty, sooty tunnel.

"In many industries, CCS is a sunset option to get high emissions assets to the end of their life," said Madrid. "But removals are present in every long-term net-zero model. They are here to stay."

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