The first thing we need to do is turn down the tap by reducing emissions, but we can’t completely shut it off today — even if we were to immediately stop all emissions, temperatures would continue to rise for decades.
The venture based in Squamish, B.C., is one of the forerunners of a technology called direct air capture , which literally sucks CO2 out of the atmosphere and either puts it back underground or uses it to make low-carbon products such as synthetic fuels.
As of December 2020, there were 26 large-scale carbon capture and storage facilities in operation worldwide and 37 at various stages of development, according to the Global CCS Institute.
Each of these facilities will be able to capture one million tonnes of carbon a year, which is roughly equivalent to the work of 40 million trees or taking 200,000 passenger vehicles off the road for a year.
After years of research, development and prototyping, Harvard professor David Keith founded Carbon Engineering in Calgary in 2009 to take the concept of direct air capture into the real world.
Then, through a series of processes, the molecules are turned into pure, compressed CO2 that can be stored or used while the rest of the air is returned to the environment with three-quarters less carbon.
Plans are also underway on a second DAC facility planned for Scotland and a DAC and fuel facility in Merritt, B.C.
Where DAC can play a large role is in helping organizations meet their net-zero pledges .
Government policy plays a huge role in kick-starting these markets by putting a price on carbon, legislating net-zero targets and allowing companies to buy carbon credits to offset emissions that are difficult or uneconomical to eliminate.
Many scientists and policy-makers have decried DAC as too costly to be effective, and many environmental groups are concerned it delays the transition away from fossil fuels.
Chris Severson-Baker, Alberta regional director at the Pembina Institute, a non-profit think tank focused on Canada’s clean energy transition, says his organization supports CCUS and thinks a significantly sized industry in Canada is necessary to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.
This year, the global commerce giant reserved 10,000 tonnes of carbon removal — the largest corporate purchase of DAC carbon removal ever publicly announced — which will be done at Carbon Engineering’s U.S.
Shopify hopes to help Carbon Engineering scale and commercialize its technologies through its investment, with an eye to driving down the cost of carbon removal so companies with smaller budgets can access it, too.
Canada also has a huge economic opportunity because we have the ideal geology to put carbon back underground — the same porous and permeable rock formations that form good oil and gas reservoirs — and could export carbon credits to countries that don’t, Oldham says.