G7 meets in a carbon-rich paradise to demand less carbon



As Canadians host the 50th annual G7 Summit this week in Kananaskis, Alberta, they can expect a deluge of “climate-saving” proclamations — rhetoric divorced from scientific evidence and economic reality.

This elite gathering of the world’s leading economies, along with the European Union, plans to spotlight climate resilience, net-zero targets, green certification, and renewable energy. But the most heavily hyped technology on the agenda will likely be carbon capture — a scheme billed as the silver bullet for saving the planet from carbon dioxide emissions.

NASA has credited rising CO2 levels with 70% of Earth’s recent greening. More carbon dioxide, not less, helps feed the world.

Carbon capture refers to the removal of carbon dioxide from industrial exhaust or directly from the air. The captured gas is then injected underground or used commercially, such as for boosting oil production. That latter application has proven highly effective worldwide. But the idea of scaling up carbon capture to cool the planet is not just costly — it’s potentially counterproductive.

Carbon capture as a climate fix imposes heavy costs with no measurable benefits. It burdens consumers, risks environmental harm, and distracts from more effective energy solutions. Most proposals target emissions from coal- or gas-fired power plants, where the captured CO2 would be pumped underground and stored permanently.

With Alberta phasing out coal in favor of natural gas, the cost implications matter. Using data from the U.S. National Energy Technology Laboratory, we examined what it would cost to retrofit gas-fired plants in the province with carbon capture.

NETL analyzed two natural gas combined cycle plants: a 727-megawatt and a 992-megawatt facility. The numbers are staggering. For the smaller unit, construction and startup costs would jump from $760 million to $1.4 billion. Annual operation and maintenance would rise from $29 million to $55 million.

For the larger plant, the picture is no better. Costs climb from $1.1 billion to $1.9 billion to build and launch, and annual maintenance surges from $39 million to $70 million — an 80% increase.

On top of the financial hit, carbon capture reduces energy output by about 11%. That means consumers would pay more — for less electricity.

These systems also require an extensive network of pipelines to move CO2 to underground storage sites. One proposal to connect Canada’s oil sands operations with a CO2 transport system estimated the cost at $4 billion. And that’s just for the pipes.

Even if money were no object, carbon capture fails the basic test of relevance. The theory that CO2 is the primary driver of Earth’s temperature remains unproven. Natural factors — like changes in solar output, the planet’s orbit, and its axial tilt — play a far greater role. Alarmist climate models, built on faulty assumptions, fail again and again to match observed data.

According to the CO2 Coalition, even if the United States had reached net-zero emissions in 2010, the reduction in global temperature by 2100 would amount to just 0.1040 degrees Celsius. That’s not a meaningful impact. Alberta’s emissions, by comparison, are a fraction of the U.S. total.

Far from being a pollutant, carbon dioxide is essential to life. It feeds plants, boosts crop yields, and promotes ecosystem health. NASA has credited rising CO2 levels with 70% of Earth’s recent greening. More carbon dioxide, not less, helps feed the world.

Instead of obsessing over how to bury carbon, G7 leaders might do better to look around at the Canadian Rockies and ask why they’re trying to deprive the planet of the gas that makes them so green in the first place.

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Federal government pours $3.5 billion into carbon capture project in hopes of minimizing climate change, prioritizing 'environmental justice'



The U.S. federal government will dole out $3.5 billion for a carbon capture project to attempt to minimize the damage of climate change. In a statement released on Thursday, the U.S. Department of Energy announced the massive financial investment into a "program to capture and store carbon dioxide (CO2) pollution directly from the air."

The Department of Energy promised the $3.5 million climate change project would help in "prioritizing community engagement and environmental justice."

"The Regional Direct Air Capture Hubs program will support four large-scale, regional direct air capture hubs that each comprise a network of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) projects to help address the impacts of climate change, creating good-paying jobs and prioritizing community engagement and environmental justice," the Department of Energy statement reads. "In addition to efforts to deeply decarbonize the economy through methods like clean power, efficiency, and industrial innovation, the widespread deployment of direct air capture technologies and CO2 transport and storage infrastructure plays a significant role in delivering on President Biden’s goal of achieving an equitable transition to a net-zero economy by 2050."

"Each of the projects selected for the Regional Direct Air Capture Hubs program will demonstrate the delivery and storage or end use of removed atmospheric carbon" the DOE statement reads. "The hubs will have the capacity to capture and then permanently store at least one million metric tons of CO2 from the atmosphere annually, either from a single unit or from multiple interconnected units."

Last December, President Joe Biden signed an executive order to ensure that the U.S. government will have net-zero emissions no later than 2050. The Guardian reported last year, "The government will cut its emissions by 65% by the end of this decade, before reaching carbon neutrality by 2050."

The locations of the hubs haven’t been disclosed as of yet.

American University defines Direct Air Capture with Carbon Storage (DACCS) as:

An approach to carbon removal in which mechanical systems capture carbon dioxide (CO2) directly from the atmosphere and compress it to be injected into geological storage or used to make long-lasting products, such as cement. There are a variety of technologies for doing this. Some use chemicals that bind with CO2 in the air and release the CO2 when heated. Others use changes in temperature, humidity, or electrical charge to capture and release CO2. Other uses of direct air capture technology, such as using captured CO2 in greenhouses or to manufacture synthetic fuels, are a form of carbon capture and use or “carbon recycling” because the CO2 returns to the atmosphere quickly after the products are consumed. Synthetic fuels made with direct air capture (“air-to-fuels”) could still contribute to mitigating climate change by displacing fossil fuels.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm cited a recent report from the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), "The UN's latest climate report made clear that removing legacy carbon pollution from the air through direct air capture and safely storing it is an essential weapon in our fight against the climate crisis."

The IPCC report states: "Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) is necessary to achieve net-zero CO2 and GHG emissions both globally and nationally, counterbalancing ‘hard-to-abate’ residual emissions. CDR is also an essential element of scenarios that limit warming to 1.5°C or likely below 2°C by 2100, regardless of whether global emissions reach near zero, net zero or net negative levels."

However, some critics of carbon direct removal (CDR) and direct air capture claim the processes allow fossil fuel producers to be left off the hook and allow energy companies to continue to use oil, natural gas, and coal.

There is also a cost consideration. A 2018 report found that it would cost $94 to $232 to remove a ton of CO2 from the atmosphere.

Business Insider reported last year that at the cost of $100 per ton of CO2, it would cost $5 trillion per year to remove all of humanity's carbon emissions. There would also need an estimated 50,000 carbon removal plants in order to capture all of our carbon emissions.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) notes, "There are currently 19 direct air capture (DAC) plants operating worldwide, capturing more than 0.01 million metric tons of CO2 a year."