05.12.23

Cantwell Reintroduces Bipartisan Natural Carbon Removal Legislation to Help Avoid Future Extreme Weather Events

Cantwell: “Just reducing future emissions is no longer enough”

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) joined Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) in reintroducing the Carbon Removal and Emissions Storage Technologies (CREST) Act, which would establish new research programs at the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Department of the Interior (DOI) focusing on natural carbon removal and storage strategies. The bill would additionally establish an innovative pilot purchasing program to accelerate carbon removal market commercialization.

The CREST Act ultimately aims to help reduce the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere in order to fight climate change and prevent more frequent and extreme weather events.

“Removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere is essential to blunting the impacts of climate change. In other words, just reducing future emissions is no longer enough,” said Sen. Cantwell at a recent hearing of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. “So we need to figure out how to remove and trap carbon pollution from the atmosphere in order to avoid more frequent and intense extreme weather … If we allow global warming to reach two degrees Celsius – and we are on track to exceed that level – the Pacific Northwest will suffer from devastating heat waves.”

Sen. Cantwell first introduced the legislation with Sen. Collins in June 2022.

With increasing private and public sector commitments to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, companies are seeking ways to invest in quantifiable, durable, and verifiable carbon removal solutions. Despite the increased interest, current cost estimates show that private sector investment alone is unlikely to be sufficient to research and deploy carbon removal pathways.

Title I of the CREST Act builds upon previously authorized carbon removal research and development programs to include biomass, geological, aquatic, and atmospheric carbon removal solutions that can permanently sequester carbon dioxide or use carbon dioxide to produce valuable products such as biofuels.

A summary of the CREST Act is available HERE, and the full bill text is available HERE.

Key areas of focus include:

Biomass Carbon Removal: Expands the scope of the DOE’s current carbon capture research to include biological carbon removal from terrestrial and aquatic sources using techniques such as algae cultivation, soil enhancements, and enhanced photosynthesis and root growth. Provisions under this section will enhance our understanding of biomass feedstocks, supplies, and logistics with respect to bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, and thermochemical biomass conversion pathways for carbon removal, including fast pyrolysis.

 

This section also expands the DOE’s scope to include biological carbon dioxide conversion. This would improve modeling and understanding of high carbon-absorbing biomass as well as establish an initiative to focus on developing new products from carbon dioxide.

Geological Carbon Removal: Spurs research, experiments, and pilot programs for conducting carbon mineralization that can trap carbon dioxide in solid form.

Provisions under this section will expand the DOE’s scope to conduct carbon mineralization pilots in consultation with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the United States Geological Survey (USGS).

This section also directs the DOI, working through USGS, to develop a methodology for a national assessment of geological resources, mine tailings, and other alkaline industrial wastes to identify sustainable sources of reactive minerals suitable for mineralizing and durably trapping carbon dioxide. Finally, it directs USGS to conduct field experiments using mine tailings and industrial wastes for carbon mineralization and study the environmental impacts of carbon mineralization.

Aquatic Carbon Removal: Expands the DOE’s scope to include ocean carbon removal pathways, such as blue carbon management, focusing on coastal and marine biomass, as well as direct ocean capture, which directly removes carbon dioxide from the oceans through engineered or inorganic processes.

Provisions under this section also direct the DOE to establish a program in coordination with NOAA and NASA that monitors, researches, and models the ecological impacts of ocean carbon dioxide removal and storage techniques.

Additionally, this section expands the CarbonSAFE Initiative to complete a national carbon mineralization assessment examining storage potential for the Outer Continental Shelf. Finally, it directs the DOE, in consultation with the Environmental Protection Agency, NOAA, and the DOI to produce a report describing the results of a nationwide study on the offshore capacity for deep sea carbon storage through activities such as sinking biomass. The report will also include recommendations to improve the security of offshore carbon storage.

Atmospheric Carbon Removal: Directs the DOE to research, develop, and demonstrate manufacturing techniques for direct air capture technologies.

Carbon Removal Quantification: Provides grant funding to entities who are seeking financial assistance to complete a techno-economic assessment or life-cycle assessment of their emissions.

Carbon Removal Purchasing Program: Creates a five-year pilot carbon removal purchasing program which utilizes an innovative reverse auction mechanism to find the most cost-efficient strategies for domestic carbon removal solutions meeting specified performance metrics.

The purchasing program will be based on two permanence tiers: a medium-term tier for processes that remove and store carbon dioxide between 100 years and 1,000 years, and a long-term tier for processes that remove and store carbon dioxide for 1,000 years or more. Seventy percent of the funding is allocated for long-term tier permanence and 30% is for medium-term tier permanence.

Projects that demonstrate outstanding potential for local and regional economic development and use technology that has the potential to eventually remove carbon dioxide below $100 per ton all-in cost are given priority. 

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