Law Commons^™

Removing Carbon Dioxide Through Artificial Upwelling And Downwelling: Legal Challenges And Opportunities, Romany M. Webb, Korey Silverman-Roati, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

A 2022 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that, to keep global average temperatures within 1.5oC above pre-industrial levels, emissions must reach net-zero by mid-century. The report concluded that achieving net-zero emissions will require the removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere “to counterbalance hard-to-abate emissions” from sectors like agriculture, aviation, and shipping. The report further noted that, if deployed at large scales, carbon dioxide removal (“CDR”) could also be used to achieve net negative emissions and thus effectively reduce the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide.

A variety of CDR techniques, both terrestrial and ocean-based, have been …