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Captain Drawdown’s weekly Sunday selection — 9 candidate stories considered, 6-9 picked. Each link carries our 1-2 sentence take so you don’t have to click everything to know what’s there. The candidate pool this week skews academic, with five research artefacts against two industry items. That makes for a cleaner-than-usual read on where the methodological frontier sits: ocean CDR efficiency, carbon-cycle asymmetries under net-negative pathways, and the discourse layer sitting on top of it all. On the commercial side, Climeworks is the only operator making noise. ...

Carbon Herald just published Whirlpool Corporation Invests In A Carbon Removal Portfolio Via ClimeFi. Carbon Herald reports that Whirlpool Corporation, the home appliances manufacturer, has secured a portfolio of durable carbon dioxide removal via the CDR procurement platform ClimeFi. The deal covers a mix of durable removal pathways rather than a single technology, following the diversified portfolio approach that ClimeFi offers corporate buyers. The move adds Whirlpool to a growing list of consumer goods and industrial companies turning to third-party platforms to access engineered and hybrid CDR supply. Specific tonnage, pricing, and the individual suppliers included in the portfolio are referenced in the full article. ...

Take on a podcast episode from Bite-Size Climate Tech, originally published Sun, 30 Au. Listen: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lydiaclinzi/episodes/Brineworks-From-Magic-Box-to-Upgraded-Suit--CO--H-for-E-Fuels-e3o34o3 TL;DR Brineworks pivoted from direct ocean capture to a closed-loop land-based system using purchased salt + reverse-osmosis water. Bigger addressable market, but loses the “ocean is free feedstock” story. Co-produces CO₂ and hydrogen from one electrochemical pH-swing box — pitched as the differentiator vs. other electrochemical direct air capture players optimizing purely for energy efficiency. Cost targets: sub-$200/t CO₂ by 2030, near $100/t by 2035. Aggressive but in the same range peers are quoting. Explicitly designed for intermittent operation (20-50% capacity factor) on cheap solar/wind — a design choice worth taking seriously. Target customer is e-fuel project developers, not carbon removal buyers. This is really a feedstock company now, not a durable removal company. Lydia Clinzi hosts Joel Parman, CTO and co-founder of Brineworks, returning to Bite-Size Climate Tech two years after his first appearance. The episode covers Brineworks’ pivot from direct ocean capture to a land-based closed-loop electrochemical system that co-produces CO₂ and green hydrogen for synthetic fuels. ...

Take on a podcast episode from Studio Energie, originally published Tue, 08 Se. Listen: https://soundcloud.com/studio-energie/gijsbrecht-gunter-yara-over-de-businesscase-van-nederlandse-co2-in-de-noorse-bodem TL;DR First cross-border CCS chain in the world went live: 800 kt/yr CO2 from Yara Sluiskil shipped to Northern Lights in Norway, 15-year contract, ~12 Mt total. Yara’s site director admits on-record the project doesn’t pencil at current ETS (~€85/t); needs a premium plus avoided carbon costs to close. Netherlands scrapping its national CO2 surcharge on top of ETS actively worsens the business case for the front-runner — Gunter says the FID likely wouldn’t be taken today under current conditions. Useful concrete cost benchmark: RED III-compliant green hydrogen for their ammonia would imply ~€15,000 per ton CO2 avoided. Damning number, first time I’ve seen it stated this cleanly. CAPEX ~€200M on Yara’s side; contract with Northern Lights “a multiple” of that. Not disclosed further. Remco de Boer (Studio Energie) interviews Gijsbrecht Gunter, director at Yara Sluiskil, on opening day of the first cross-border CCS chain — Dutch ammonia CO2 liquefied, shipped 800 km, injected under the Norwegian seabed via Northern Lights. In Dutch. The conversation is unusually candid about the economics, which is why it’s worth an hour. ...

Take on a podcast episode from The CDR Policy Scoop, originally published Tue, 08 Se. Listen: https://shows.acast.com/the-cdr-policy-scoop/episodes/mep-peter-liese-the-rapporteurs-take-on-removals-in-the-eu TL;DR Liese wants Parliament to pull removals integration forward to 2028, not the Commission’s 2031 — big signal for offtake timing. He argues for scrapping the cap on removal volumes in the ETS; if costs fall like solar did, why limit uptake. Bold, will meet resistance. Wants biochar added to eligible methods alongside DACCS and BECCS, capped ~20% max. First MEP I’ve heard commit to this on record. If the CDR-cost gap is bigger than the Commission modeled, his fix is to issue more allowances to fund the shortfall. Novel mechanism. Backs a strong link to the CRCF and wants removals inside the international-credits envelope — Namibia cement plant DACCS as concrete example. Hosts Sebastian Manhart and Eve Tamme get Peter Liese — the European People’s Party MEP who is Parliament’s rapporteur on the current EU ETS (Emissions Trading System) revision — on the record days before his draft report drops on 11 September 2026. The conversation is a near-exhaustive walk through what Parliament’s amendments to the Commission’s July 2026 removals-in-ETS proposal could look like. ...