How Climeworks identifies high-quality carbon removal

How Climeworks identifies high-quality carbon removal

Climeworks Climeworks

Climeworks

Pioneering carbon removal with Direct Air Capture to help businesses reach net-zero and drive economic growth.

发布日期: 2025年1月17日
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As global temperatures exceed 1.5°C pre-industrial levels, Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) is indispensable to reaching climate goals. With more companies seeking reliable CDR credits to offset emissions, ensuring high-quality investments is critical to avoiding greenwashing and maintaining trust.

At Climeworks , we have?developed a framework to identify the highest quality carbon removal solutions for our portfolio offering. This framework combines our internal knowledge and elements from publicly available methodologies to deliver the most effective results for customers.

Climeworks’ quality framework for carbon removal

Our framework is built on three pillars: trust, impact, and risk. Trust ensures that each credit represents a full ton of CO? removed. Impact assesses durability, scalability, and added benefits, while risk identifies potential downsides. By quantifying these aspects, we provide the most credible and effective carbon removal solutions available.

Figure 1: Core pillars of CLimeworks' quality assessment framework for carbon dioxide removal

1. Trust

The credibility of CDR hinges on net CO? removal—each credit must represent one ton of CO? removed from the atmosphere. Climeworks ensures this through:

  • Measurability: Accurate, conservative CO? measurements and verified baselines.
  • End-to-end carbon accounting: Comprehensive lifecycle analysis to calculate net CO? removals (see figure below).
  • Additionality: Ensuring projects wouldn't happen without carbon credit sales.
  • Third-party certification: Independent certification ensures credits meet established carbon standards.

Figure 2: End-to-end carbon accounting—Climeworks' waterfall modell

2. Impact

High-quality CDR projects deliver more than just CO2 sequestration. They offer benefits like:

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  • Permanence: The longevity of CO2 storage, with geologically stored CO2 offering long-term retention.
  • Social and environmental co-benefits: Including job creation, stronger local economies, and improved food security. CDR projects can also enhance biodiversity, soil quality, and reduce the risks of wildfires and soil erosion.
  • Availability and scalability: The volume of CDR credits available today and in the future. Sustainable scaling is critical, considering energy, land, and water use.
  • Price: Assessing the cost of CO? removal, the social cost of carbon, and ensuring that higher prices align with higher quality.

3. Risk

CDR projects involve several risks, including:

  • Storage reversal risk: The risk of sequestered CO? returning to the atmosphere. Mitigation strategies include site selection and robust monitoring.
  • Leakage: When CDR efforts cause emissions elsewhere. Addressing leakage involves careful project planning and monitoring.
  • Social and environmental risks: Ensuring projects are socially and environmentally responsible through transparent engagement with communities and rigorous environmental standards.
  • Execution risks: Involving financial stability, operational efficiency, and the ability to deliver promised CO? removals.

Figure 3: Risk matrix visualizing how the likelihood of an event (horizontal axis) and its severity (vertical axis) combine to yield a risk score. Scores range from low (green) to high (red), guiding prioritization of mitigation actions.

Conclusion

While the CDR market may seem complex, investing in high-quality CDR projects today is essential for achieving net zero targets and positioning for future demand. Climeworks’ rigorous framework ensures that every credit meets high standards of trust, impact, and risk management, providing buyers with the confidence to invest in solutions that will have a real, lasting climate impact.


Curious to learn more? Reach out—we are excited to answer your questions.


Marek Chrapa

R&D, Process Engineer and Inventor | Materials + Semiconductors | Physics Chemistry Optics Fluid Mechanics| Weather and Climate Engineering | Earthquake and Extreme Weather Predictions, Holographic Climate Global Model

3 周

I have a holographic climate model that is based on the sun's holography effects causing weather effects, including earthquakes. I ask for collaboration. The model allows also weather modification, therefore, limited publishing is asked at the beginning for the safety of and still to be able to predict something. When people will start to modify the weather on their own then nothing will be predictable anymore. Scientists have broken hearts when they can't publish because of safety. The financing of science depends on publishing. Giving public the whether modification recipe is going beyond science and ethical rules. What to do? How to collaborate and make the world secure at the same time and weather predictable. The holographic climate model. The next World global climate model. After the European and US climate models? I called ECMWF they even don't disclose persons to contract for climate modeling. https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/activity-7294765094440255488-04Ty?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/activity-7294700607334965248-pBcV?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/activity-7294620241383325696-Toxn?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

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