The world will need negative carbon technology, such as direct air capture, if there is any chance of limiting global average temperature rise to 1.5-degrees, Klaus Lackner, director of the Center for Negative Carbon Emissions at Arizona State University told Yale Environment 360 in a recent question and answer.
Lackner notes that because carbon stays in the atmosphere for an extended period, even if all carbon emissions were to stop today, the earth would continue to warm for quite some time. “[I]n reality, we’ve probably already overshot the [1.5-degree] goal because of the inertia in the system. At this point, we need to figure out how to go backwards, and that is where air capture plays a big role,” Lackner said.
Direct air capture is extremely expensive, making it difficult to convince anyone to build these systems. ”Why would I adopt it if there isn’t yet a price on carbon? What incentive do I have as a company to do this? Never mind what the price is, even if you tell me it is 1$ a ton, why would I do it?” he said.
To incentivize the use of direct air capture, the conversation around CO2 emissions needs to change, according to Lackner. “My view is we need to change the way we think about C02 and recognize that it is a waste disposal issue. If we called it ‘C02 dumping’ rather than ‘C02 emissions,’ maybe we would have solved the problem by now,” Lackner said.