Why engineered carbon removals are at odds with energy security and affordability

At the heart of net zero is a reliance on negative emissions, or carbon removals, to counterbalance emissions from sectors such as agriculture, shipping and aviation. However, the costs of engineered carbon removals – i.e. those reliant on technologies rather than nature-based solutions – could be prohibitive at the scale currently envisaged in many countries’ net zero strategies. This paper investigates how greater international cooperation and reduced reliance on engineered removals could minimize the tensions between, on the one hand, rising energy security and affordability concerns and, on the other, the costs of pursuing net zero.The paper analyses the most recent cost estimates for bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) and for direct air carbon capture and storage (DACCS). Assuming wood pellet prices corresponding to 2027 forward prices, and that BECCS is responsible for 99 per cent of the 2050 global deployment of engineered removals, as is the case within the IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report (AR6), it is calculated that costs could climb from the high end of a $192–$315 billion/yr range to up to $460 billion a year.These high costs stem from the high heat energy input requirements of engineered removals; such inputs account for nearly 50 per cent of the cost of DACCS, and for at least 33 per cent of the cost of BECCS.In the context of high debt-to-GDP levels across many countries, and with military spending on the rise in a multi-polar world, the risk is that future engineered removals costs could become increasingly incompatible with policy imperatives that prioritize energy security and affordability. In such a scenario, the reliance on engineered carbon removals that many countries have already incorporated in their net zero planning would no longer be achievable. This in turn would widen the global ‘emissions gap’ – the gap between the emissions countries are likely to produce under their current commitments, and what is actually needed in line with the Paris Agreement goals – and increase the likelihood of triggering accelerated climate change.Greater international cooperation between countries is required to minimize the costs and risks associated with BECCS and DACCS. Such work will need to:Acknowledge that countries do not possess the same geological and biophysical assets that would allow equal provision of sustainable, permanent and affordable CO₂ removal at scale, globally. Regions with geological storage sites will need to collaborate with regions with significant biomass resources.Renew efforts to build international governance concerning the permanence of CO₂ within geological storage sites.Establish new international standards around the entire supply chain to drive down costs, as well as regulating sustainability standards pertaining to biomass.Facilitate the sharing of technological innovations to reduce costs.Greater transparency is needed between commercial developers of BECCS and DACCS, governments and the public regarding costs, allowing for the sensitivity of commercial information.Within net zero strategies, the split between emissions reductions and removals needs to be clearly defined, to reduce the risks of over-reliance on engineered carbon removal offsets that could fail to fully materialize. This split can be reviewed and amended over time as engineered removal technologies are deployed and more evidence of their performance becomes available.There is scope for costs and risks to be shared and minimized through a more collaborative international approach to BECCS and DACCS. Valuable lessons could be drawn from cooperation in the civil nuclear sector. But, as in the case of nuclear, even where costs are minimized, this does not mean that engineered removals are low-cost solutions.Not only do engineered carbon removals technologies critically rely on high energy input operational expenditure. As a largely retrofitted technology applied to at most hundreds of large power stations, BECCS deployment is unlikely to see the rapid cost reductions that have been achieved through mass production of modular technologies like solar panels, wind turbines and electric vehicle batteries.This means that greater focus must be placed on energy efficiency and demand management to reduce reliance on engineered removals, and simultaneously ease both energy security and affordability concerns.