Direct Air Capture vs Embodied Carbon Reductions
In an article in the April 1, 2024 New York Times by David Gelles, two (DAC) projects were highlighted. The first project is in Iceland, and the second one is in Midland, Texas. The project in Iceland is by Climeworks, and has the current capacity of removing about 36,000 metric tons of CO2 per year. The project in Midland is under construction by the petroleum giant Occidental, and when complete will have the capacity to remove 500,000 metric tons per year - after all this is in Texas! To put this in perspective, if the world reduces its embodied carbon in 2024 by 8%, a number that is close to that required for a 1.7C temperature cap, it would keep 0.181 billion metric tons of CO2 from being emitted, or 362 times what the Occidental project will remove in one year of operations. The leader of Occidental has stated that this will allow the company to extend their ability to produce oil and gas into the future(!). It would be interesting to know what the embodied carbon emissions of the Midland facility are.