![]() The scale of the scale-up challenge however should not be underestimated. While DAC is not without its sceptics, the technology has garnered increasing policy, investor, and media attention for its potential to scale-up to become a valuable carbon removal solution ( Scott and Geden, 2018 Cox et al., 2020 Sekera and Lichtenberger, 2020). This approach is therefore the technical focus of this paper, as well as the Swiss firm Climeworks, Global Thermostat in the US, and the China-based Carbon Infinity. Solid sorbent-based systems are more modular in nature, involving a standardised and highly-scalable manufacturing process to produce air capture modules. Commercial liquid solvent-based systems typically resemble a large-scale industrial plant and the technology has been pioneered by the Canadian firm Carbon Engineering. One uses a solid chemical sorbent to capture CO 2 and the other uses a liquid solvent. There are two dominant technical approaches to conduct DAC. Regardless of individual perspective concerning the respective merits and limitations of engineered or nature-based carbon removal pathways (land-use, permanence, energy requirements, cost), a comprehensive suite of CDR solutions will be necessary to achieve carbon removal resembling anything close to a climate consequential scale although the scope of this perspective is centred on scaling-up modular DAC technology. Ambition on such a scale candidly demands the development of a globally consequential carbon removal industry.Įngineered approaches to CDR include direct air capture of CO 2 or DAC ( Breyer et al., 2019 Hou et al., 2019), bio-energy with carbon capture and storage or BECCS ( Fridahl and Lehtveer, 2018 Hanssen et al., 2020), and enhanced rock weathering ( Strefler et al., 2018 Beerling et al., 2020), alongside more widely recognised nature-based solutions including reforestation, afforestation, soil carbon sequestration, and peatland restoration ( Seddon et al., 2020). This is evidenced in models reviewed by the IPCC where all pathways that limit global warming to 1.5☌ with limited or no overshoot project the use of CDR on the order of up to 1,000 GtCO 2, that is 1 trillion tonnes of carbon dioxide, over the twenty-first century ( IPCC, 2018). Increasingly broad consensus exists within the scientific community with respect to the necessity of widespread carbon removal to limit temperature rise within “safe” levels, aligned with the purview of the Paris Agreement. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) 2018 Special Report found a remaining carbon budget of 420 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide (GtCO 2)-further depleted to 66%) chance of limiting warming to 1.5☌ above pre-industrial levels ( IPCC, 2018 Le Quéré et al., 2018 Friedlingstein et al., 2019). In conjunction with economy-wide decarbonisation, carbon dioxide removal (CDR) has shifted from a desirable component to an invaluable element in the formula of addressing runaway global temperature rise. In particular, we look at approaches to drive demand and scale-up DAC module production, and opportunities presented in the development of an integrated DAC manufacturing industry. In addition, insight is offered through the work of DAC start-up Carbon Infinity into the industry supply-chain position, adopting lessons from computing, and energy technologies. To achieve a climate relevant DAC industry will demand innovative procurement models, for example carbon purchase agreements (CPAs), and dedicated DAC manufacturing facilities or dactories. Modular, solid-sorbent DAC on a gigatonne scale will require the mass mobilisation of supply chains to manufacture millions of modular DAC units−20 million of the present state of the art 50 tonne/year modules to deliver 1 gigatonne per year, as well as the large-scale production of novel chemical sorbents. This gives rise to an assumption that solutions, for example direct air capture (DAC)-involving the direct removal of carbon dioxide from ambient air-can be commercialised and deployed at the necessary speed and scale to have a material impact, in the order of gigatonnes, by mid-century. Natural and engineered carbon dioxide removal have become regular features of climate models which limit warming to 1.5☌ or even 2☌ above pre-industrial levels. 2China-UK Low Carbon College, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.
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