CDR

Durability & Permanence Durability (often used interchangeably with permanence) is the expected time that a tonne of carbon dioxide, once removed from the atmosphere, stays out of it. It is the single variable that most cleanly separates a nature-based credit priced in the low tens of dollars from an engineered credit priced in the high hundreds — and it is the variable that determines whether a corporate buyer can defensibly count a purchase against a net-zero claim. As Fankhauser et al. (2021) argue, “net zero” is only coherent if residual emissions are matched with removals of comparable longevity; a fossil CO₂ molecule released today and a soil-carbon credit that reverses in 30 years do not cancel out in any physically meaningful sense. ...

Take on a YouTube video from Bite-Size Climate Tech, originally posted 2026-08-31. Watch the source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1KylS2Dnq8 TL;DR Brineworks (formerly pitched as direct ocean capture) has moved its electrochemical pH-swing box onto land, running a closed salt-water loop instead of once-through seawater. Core pitch: co-produces high-purity CO₂ and green hydrogen from the same electrolyzer, targeting e-fuel feedstock rather than pure carbon removal. Deliberately higher energy per unit output, but low capex, earth-abundant materials, no rare earths or expensive membranes — designed to run 20–50% duty cycle on cheap intermittent renewables. Interviewer confusingly introduces the guest as “Brimstone” CTO Joe Peraman; company is Brineworks. Worth flagging before you cite. Light on numbers — no $/tCO₂, no $/kg H₂, no energy intensity figures. Directional, not diligence-grade. Video link. This is a short “Bite-Size Climate Tech” follow-up with Brineworks CTO/co-founder Joe Peraman, two years after his first appearance when the company was still an electrochemical direct ocean capture (DOC) play. The substantive update: they’ve abandoned seawater feed, replaced it with a closed-loop synthetic brine (RO water plus bagged salts), and repositioned as a co-producer of CO₂ and green H₂ for e-fuel synthesis. ...

Take on a YouTube video from The Odd Vault, originally posted 2026-08-31. Watch the source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hltbVu1tsQM TL;DR Claims Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s enzymatic structural material (ESM) sequesters “more than 6 kg CO2 per cubic meter” vs. concrete’s ~330 kg emitted. If true, small net-negative delta per m³ — worth checking the primary source. Mechanism: carbonic anhydrase enzyme mineralizes CO2 into calcite that binds sand into a structural matrix. Legit chemistry, not new — Rahbar’s group has been publishing on this since ~2019. Name-drops UK startup Eureka (Strathclyde spin-off) using plant-derived enzymes and sourcing CO2 from distilleries/biogas. Useful pointer if verifiable. Frames ESM as “no sacrifice” drop-in replacement for concrete. Overstated — no mention of compressive strength, cost, or scale of production demonstrated. Cement = ~8% of global CO2 figure is correctly cited. Video link. This is an 8-minute explainer from The Odd Vault, a general-audience science channel, pitching enzymatic biocementation — specifically Nima Rahbar’s ESM at WPI — as a carbon-negative alternative to Portland cement. The core claim: an enzyme (carbonic anhydrase) catalyzes CO2 + calcium + water into calcite crystals that bind sand into a structural matrix, curing in hours and net-sequestering carbon. ...

Captain Drawdown’s weekly Sunday selection — 8 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 week’s signal is concentrated on enhanced rock weathering, with two peer-reviewed papers pulling in opposite directions on whether ERW can actually deliver at scale, alongside a commercial deal extending ERW credit access. Around that core, offshore CCS gains a new contractor entrant and mineralization-in-concrete gets a fresh LCA scrutiny. ...

Take on a podcast episode from Carbon Removal Newsroom, originally published Tue, 25 Au. Listen: https://climateworkersanonymous.com/p/10-hype-and-a-gold-rush-followed TL;DR Anonymous submission argues carbon dioxide removal (CDR) is living out a textbook boom-bust: 2022-2024 gold rush, now contraction. Not novel, but fairly stated. Frames CDR as commodity-like and therefore structurally cyclical, with hoped-for upward trendline. Reasonable analogy, understates policy-driven demand fragility. Prescription: counter-cyclical discipline at the individual/company level — conservative in booms, patient in busts. Sensible but generic. Kenyon’s own gloss: blaming “macro conditions” explains everything and nothing; entrepreneurs are supposed to trim sails. Useful pushback. Bonus tangent: Stripe’s Collisons reportedly calling “singularity” internally — Kenyon wonders what that means for CDR buyers. Speculative but worth noting. Ross Kenyon’s Climate Workers Anonymous #10 runs a single anonymous submission on the CDR business cycle: how a 2022-2024 hype phase drove overexpansion, and how the current contraction is the predictable other side of that same coin. Kenyon reads the submission, then layers on his own commentary about founders using “macro conditions” as a catch-all excuse and about what a nearer-than-expected AI capability jump might mean for CDR buyer behavior. ...

Take on a podcast episode from The Carbon Curve, originally published Wed, 26 Au. Listen: https://carboncurve.substack.com/p/canadas-next-industrial-play-what TL;DR Miniseries opener framing carbon removal as a layer on Canada’s $1T industrial buildout ahead of Carney’s September investment summit — useful political framing. Jim Mann (UNDO) claims enhanced rock weathering on farmland accelerates natural weathering “50 to 100,000 times” — the upper bound feels rhetorical, but the mechanism is standard. UNDO’s model: give crushed silicate to farmers free, cover transport and spreading, keep all carbon revenue. Farmer-adoption pragmatism, not revenue-sharing idealism. Mann’s claim: Canada’s 100–300 Mt/yr residual removal need “could all be done with enhanced rock weathering.” Overstated, but the feedstock-plus-farmland argument is real. CFA’s Brody Berrigan on why adoption stalls: farmers are business owners first, extension services have been gutted since the ’90s, neighbor-to-neighbor is the real diffusion channel. Na’im Merchant kicks off a Carbon Curve miniseries on embedding durable carbon dioxide removal into Canadian industrial projects, timed to Prime Minister Carney’s September 14-15 investment summit. Episode here. Episode one pairs UNDO founder Jim Mann on enhanced rock weathering economics with the Canadian Federation of Agriculture’s Brody Berrigan on what it actually takes to get Prairie farmers to say yes. ...

Take on a podcast episode from The CDR Policy Scoop, originally published Sun, 23 Au. Listen: https://shows.acast.com/the-cdr-policy-scoop/episodes/what-does-cdr-actually-cost-in-europe-with-hansjorg-lerchenm TL;DR Commission’s ETS review cost forecasts for durable CDR trace to just four sources (McKinsey 2023, Ramboll Ecologic 2025, NEGEM 2023, CDR.fyi 2023) — thinner foundation than the policy weight implies. Bio-CCS low-cost anchor of €172/t leans on €165/t of assumed energy revenue and calibration against an unverifiable 2022 Drax conference remark. Overstated confidence. direct air carbon capture and storage (DACCS) range comes entirely from a black-box McKinsey report; no inspectable assumptions on energy, T&S, or learning rate. Useful flag. Biochar low bound (€37–66/t) reflects Global South artisanal systems; Hansjörg says European scalable price is €175–200/t. First-time-cited industry number worth having. Practical asks: modelers should use current CDR.fyi data, be transparent about assumptions, and suppliers should submit transaction data. Signal-dense. Eve Tamme and Sebastian Manhart host Eadbhard Pernot (Carbon Management Europe) and Hansjörg Lerchenmüller (Biochar Europe) to stress-test the cost assumptions behind the European Commission’s July 2026 ETS review impact assessment. The episode walks through bio-CCS, DACCS, and biochar carbon removal cost curves line by line — where the numbers actually come from, and where they fall apart. ...

Take on a YouTube video from Annie Luo, originally posted 2026-08-24. Watch the source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27j8NEY2bR0 TL;DR Matt Green (ASU, Center for Negative Carbon Emissions) walks through moisture-swing and polymer sorbent direct air capture. Standard intro material for CDR insiders. Claim: moisture-swing sorbents release CO₂ via humidity change, no 80–120°C thermal swing needed. Well-established (Lackner lineage) but clearly explained. Interesting application angle: coupling moisture-swing DAC to greenhouse exhaust streams to boost plant growth. Niche but concrete. Argues polymer sorbents win on cost because plastics processing infrastructure is already cheap and mature. Reasonable, underexplored framing. No new numbers, no cost figures, no pilot data disclosed. This is a public-education interview, not a technical update. Matt Green, chemical engineering professor at Arizona State University and director of the Center for Negative Carbon Emissions, sits down with student interviewer Annie Luo (video here) for a general-audience walkthrough of direct air capture (DAC): why 400 ppm makes selective sorbents hard, why polymer chemistry is well-suited to the problem, and how moisture-swing regeneration sidesteps the thermal energy penalty of amine systems. If you already know what a moisture-swing sorbent is, most of this will be review. ...