Wednesday

29th Mar 2023

EU carbon-removal scheme dubbed 'smokescreen for inaction'

  • Experts warn new EU carbon removal certifying rules are too 'vague' and prone to misuse, lobbying and accounting tricks (Photo: Skaja Lee)
Listen to article

On Wednesday (30 November), the EU Commission will launch a plan to certify the removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as part of its efforts to reach zero emissions by 2050.

The so-called Carbon Removal Certification Framework (CRCF) will set the rules for companies and policymakers to monitor, report and verify carbon dioxide is indeed physically removed from the atmosphere.

Read and decide

Join EUobserver today

Become an expert on Europe

Get instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.

... or subscribe as a group

Carbon can be stored in the soil using modern farming methods or by planting trees; it can be scrubbed out of the sea by marine algae or sucked directly out of the atmosphere using giant filtering machines—a fledgling technology backed by billionaire funders like Bill Gates and Elon Musk.

EU policymakers increasingly believe carbon dioxide removal (CDR) is a critical third pillar of climate action—alongside emission reductions and adaptation measures to defend against the devastating effects of climate change.

At a conference earlier this year, EU climate chief Frans Timmermans said carbon removal is "indispensable" to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.

Lobbying battleground

But experts warn the rules are too "vague" and are prone to misuse, lobbying and accounting tricks.

The proposal will not become operational for years, leaving room for companies, civil society and other 'stakeholders' to influence the details.

"We're going to see a big push to stretch the scope of the rules to include everything that 'stores' carbon, no matter for how long," Wijnand Stoefs, a policy officer at Carbon Market Watch, an official observer at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, told EUobserver.

The proposal sets up a certification system for three main areas, comprising carbon farming, carbon storage and products which, in theory, can store carbon.

But it does not offer any details on how long the carbon has to be stored to count.

"A 'carbon storage product' is an extremely vague term. This can include furniture, building material, cardboard and even plastics," Stoefs said. "Most of these things will be burned or decomposed in a relatively short period of time."

Even buildings made of wood—often cited as a potential carbon sink—are unlikely to last hundreds of years. By comparison: CO2 emissions hang around in the atmosphere for a long time: between 300 and 1,000 years.

It also needs to be clarified what "carbon farming" means precisely, Stoefs said. It generally refers to methods that store carbon in soils or forests.

But according to a research paper published in August by the Oslo-based environmental NGO Bellona Europa, it is also regularly used to refer to biomass which could be used for fuel.

Clear rules could prevent this, but according to Stoefs, there is already a push for laxer oversight.

In its April conclusions, the EU Council noted the need for a "flexible yet administratively lean scheme" of oversight and a "wider range of practices" that could be included under the rules.

Smokescreen for inaction

In a letter published on Monday, a group of eight environmental organisations, including Corporate Europe Observatory and Germany's Heinrich Böll Stiftung, warned the current proposal could "generate false confidence in unproven future CDR[-techniques]."

"The EU is shifting the focus away from the essential work of phasing out fossil fuels, instead heading towards speculative technologies," the letter said. They also warn carbon removal and carbon-offset markets—like planting trees to offset flight emissions— are "smokescreens" for inaction.

With global co2 emissions rapidly increasing, the window to limit global warming to 1.5 Celsius above pre-industrial levels, as agreed on by 194 countries under the 2015 Paris climate agreement, will soon be closed.

Current policy pledges are projected by the International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) to warm the planet by 2.7 degrees in 2100— a level scientists say will likely set off irreversible tipping points.

To compensate for excess emissions, countries have promised to reforest an area twice the size of India. In a 2021 pathway published by oil and gas major Shell, an area 'approaching the size of Brazil' would have to be reforested to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees celsius — "absurd", Stoefs said.

Trading carbon credits

Shell also advocated for carbon removal credits to be traded on a voluntary market to compensate for fossil-fuel emissions which it projects will be necessary until 2100.

The upcoming EU carbon framework proposal does not specify how carbon removal certificates will be used. But the commission has shown a willingness to consider voluntary markets as a way to "upscale" carbon removal as a business and "foster new industrial value chains for the sustainable capture, recycling, transport and storage of carbon."

"This is taking market fundamentalism to a ridiculous extreme," Duncan McLaren, a research fellow at Lancaster University, also told EUobserver. Trading carbon credits requires not only a fool-proof system based on tight monitoring and clear rules. It also implies interchangeability between removal methods.

But "one tonne of removed carbon is not the same as the other,¨ McLaren said. "Temporary reforestation schemes won't compensate for industrial emissions that stay in the atmosphere for a thousand years."

"Compensating the burning of fossil fuels by reforestation is a non-starter," Stoefs also said.

In a white paper published in October, the Brussels-based NGO Carbon Gap argues that certificates should be used as a reporting tool only and not serve as a basis for a system for compensation claims.

"Every time we use removals to compensate, we're really just causing further delay," Stoefs said.

Opinion

The fossil-fuel agenda behind EU's carbon-capture plans

The fossil-fuel industry is using the carbon removal agenda to get yet more support for failed carbon capture, which is a key component of the pie-in-the-sky carbon removal technologies being promoted by the EU Commission.

Opinion

Is EU making same mistake as US 'carbon-farming' gamble?

The European Commission will soon propose a legal framework allowing companies to buy offsetting carbon removals from farmers. Despite good intentions, lessons from similar projects in the US suggest that such schemes could end up doing more harm than good

EU approves 2035 phaseout of polluting cars and vans

The agreement will ban the sale of carbon-emitting cars after 2035. The EU Commission will present a proposal for e-fuels after pressure from German negotiators via a delegated act, which can still be rejected by the EU Parliament.

Opinion

Dear EU, the science is clear: burning wood for energy is bad

The EU and the bioenergy industry claim trees cut for energy will regrow, eventually removing extra CO2 from the atmosphere. But regrowth is not certain, and takes time, decades or longer. In the meantime, burning wood makes climate change worse.

Opinion

EU's new critical raw materials act could be a recipe for conflict

Solar panels, wind-turbines, electric vehicle batteries and other green technologies require minerals including aluminium, cobalt and lithium — which are mined in some of the most conflict-riven nations on earth, such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Guinea, and Kazakhstan.

Latest News

  1. The overlooked 'crimes against children' ICC arrest warrant
  2. EU approves 2035 phaseout of polluting cars and vans
  3. New measures to shield the EU against money laundering
  4. What does China really want? Perhaps we could try asking
  5. Dear EU, the science is clear: burning wood for energy is bad
  6. Biden's 'democracy summit' poses questions for EU identity
  7. Finnish elections and Hungary's Nato vote in focus This WEEK
  8. EU's new critical raw materials act could be a recipe for conflict

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. InformaConnecting Expert Industry-Leaders, Top Suppliers, and Inquiring Buyers all in one space - visit Battery Show Europe.
  2. EFBWWEFBWW and FIEC do not agree to any exemptions to mandatory prior notifications in construction
  3. Nordic Council of MinistersNordic and Baltic ways to prevent gender-based violence
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersCSW67: Economic gender equality now! Nordic ways to close the pension gap
  5. Nordic Council of MinistersCSW67: Pushing back the push-back - Nordic solutions to online gender-based violence
  6. Nordic Council of MinistersCSW67: The Nordics are ready to push for gender equality

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. Azerbaijan Embassy9th Southern Gas Corridor Advisory Council Ministerial Meeting and 1st Green Energy Advisory Council Ministerial Meeting
  2. EFBWWEU Social Dialogue review – publication of the European Commission package and joint statement of ETUFs
  3. Oxfam InternationalPan Africa Program Progress Report 2022 - Post Covid and Beyond
  4. WWFWWF Living Planet Report
  5. Europan Patent OfficeHydrogen patents for a clean energy future: A global trend analysis of innovation along hydrogen value chains

Join EUobserver

Support quality EU news

Join us