Climate Workers Anonymous

In March, the Department of Energy (DoE) announced they were going to putting $22M into research for capturing carbon dioxide from the air. They just announced the fundees! Join panelist Tito Jankowski of AirMiners and Negative and follow along on this page with us as he walks us through the groups and some of the science behind these processes.

This episode features Dr. Jane Zelikova, Chief Scientist at Carbon180, and Dr. Trisha Shrum, behavorial and environmental economist at the University of Vermont.

Jane organized The Royal Society's new Interface Focus issue on carbon dioxide removal called, "Going negative: An interdisciplinary, holistic approach to carbon dioxide removal". She additionally wrote an article in it, "The future of carbon dioxide removal must be transdisciplinary". Trisha also wrote an article in this issue, "Behavioural frameworks to understand public perceptions of and risk response to carbon dioxide removal". We walk through what this issue covers and then discuss in greater detail Trisha's research and the basics of behavioral economics & science and what that has to say about carbon removal.

This week's guests are Nori's Director of Corporate Development, Alexsandra Guerra; and Carbon180's Senior Policy Advisor Ugbaad Kosar, and Policy Advisor Vanessa Suarez.

Here are the topics and articles we discussed:

• Microsoft's RFP for their carbon negativity commitments, and Apple's carbon neutrality commitment.


• Full Committee Hearing to Examine Development and Deployment of Large-Scale Carbon Dioxide Management Technologies


• CREATE Act


• REPLANT Act


• FARM Act (& its biochar provisions)

N.B. The self-titled Beyonce is the one Ross had in mind; crucial shownote, we know. Here is Carbon180's newsletter as well.

This week's panelists are Dr. Jane Zelikova, Chief Scientist at Carbon180; Vanessa Suarez, Policy Advisor at Carbon180; and Aldyen Donnelly, Director of Carbon Economics at Nori.

Here are the articles we discussed this week:

• Carbon removal represented in the Appropriations process in both Energy & Water and Agriculture.


• The Biden-Sanders climate plan: "Biden-Sanders Unity Task Force Recommendations: Combating the Climate Crisis and Pursuing Environmental Justice" [PDF].


• "Potential for large-scale CO2 removal via enhanced rock weathering with croplands" in Nature.

This week's panelists are Ugbaad Kosar, Senior Policy Advisor at Carbon180; Tito Jankowski, cofounder of Negative, a startup making jewelry from captured carbon dioxide, and host of the AirMiners community; and Aldyen Donnelly, Director of Carbon Economics at the Nori carbon removal marketplace. 

This week's stories are:

• Rhodium Group's new report: "Capturing New Jobs and New Business: Growth Opportunities from Direct Air Capture Scale-Up" details how direct air capture might create jobs, be supported by policy, etc. Ugbaad wrote up a short summary of it here.


• The Growing Climate Solutions Act had a full committee hearing, and we learn more about what happens moving forward.


• The House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis released a new report, "Solving the Climate Crisis: The Congressional Action Plan for a Clean Energy Economy and a Healthy, Just, and Resilient America" that has implications for carbon removal.

This week's panelists are Aldyen Donnelly, Nori's Director of Carbon Economics, and Tito Jankowksi, cofounder of Negative (a startup making products out of captured atmospheric carbon dioxide) and host of the AirMiners community.

Here are the articles discussed:

1. "Unilever’s New Climate Plan Puts Carbon Labels on 70,000 Products" by Akshat Rathi in Bloomberg Green.


2. "Impossible Foods CEO says the meat industry will be obsolete in 15 years — ‘That’s our mission’" by Tyler Clifford on CNBC.


3. WRI's webinar on soil carbon: "Why Regenerative Agriculture Is Good for Soil Health, but Has Limited Potential to Mitigate Climate Change".

Here's the link to apply to join the AirMiners Slack community, and here is Cool Farm Tool.

This week's panelists are Nori's Director of Corporate Development Alexsandra Guerra, Director of Carbon Economics Aldyen Donnelly, and Carbon180's Chief Scientist Dr. Jane Zelikova.

Here are the articles we discussed:

• "Rising sea levels could wipe out mangroves by 2050" by Justine Calma in The Verge


• "The Energy 202: Two GOP senators join with Democrats to back bill to help cut emissions from farms" by Dino Grandoni in The Washington Post


• "Inside Microsoft's Mission to Go Carbon Negative" by Dina Bass in Bloomberg Green


• "Swiss Re Sees Opportunities for Insurers in Carbon-Capture Push" by Alastair Marsh & Marion Halftermeyer in Bloomberg Green

This week's panelists are all Norinauts! We had on Nori's Director of Corporate Development Alexsandra Guerra, Director of Carbon Economics Aldyen Donnelly, and "moonlighting marketer" Mellina White.

We discussed four topics:

1. Climate justice: Mellina and Ross recorded a bonus episode of Reversing Climate Change earlier this week as a brief introduction to Black Lives Matter, climate justice, and carbon removal. Mellina is back to follow up and also share about the reform efforts of Campaign Zero.


2. Climeworks closed a 73M CHF financing round.


3. Savory Institute and Timberland have a new partnership around regenerative leather for a new line of boots.


4. New rules for the 45Q tax credit.

If you like the show, you can join our community and support us on Patreon, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts/iTunes or Stitcher, tell your friends, share us on social media, etc. Thank you so much for listening!

An entirely new format! Carbon Removal Newsroom is now a panel show. We are finding our cadence now, and new episodes should come out weekly, biweekly, monthly—we will see—with panelists from the world of carbon removal to give listeners the latest in carbon removal news.

This week's news: Stripe has announced its first negative emissions purchases! Climeworks, Project Vesta, CarbonCure, and Charm Industrial were selected after a rather interesting and open-source vetting process. The panelists discuss issues of permanence, the tradeoffs between various industrial, ecological, and hybrid approaches to carbon removal, and what this means for the sector as a whole.

This week's panelists:

• Noah Deich, Founder and Executive Director of Carbon180


• Tito Jankowski, Cofounder of Negative and the AirMiners virtual community


• Aldyen Donnelly, Cofounder and Director of Carbon Economics at Nori

You can support the show and become a part of our community by becoming a patron on Patreon! Please do if you feel so moved.

Dr. Jane Zelikova is Carbon180's Chief Scientist, and she is one of the contributors of their latest report, "Leading with Soil: Scaling Soil Carbon Storage in Agriculture". Which sorts of policy changes may be necessary to make carbon farming the dominant paradigm of agriculture? Jane shares her expertise on the topic.

"Leading with Soil: Scaling Soil Carbon Storage in Agriculture", a report by Cabron180

"Why is soil carbon measurement so tricky?—w/ Dr. Jane Zelikova of Carbon180", Jane's appearance on Reversing Climate Change

Jane's Twitter

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