According to new atlas, as part of its ambition to achieve a net zero economy by 2050, the U.S. Department of energy (DOE) has been strengthening its plans to promote the removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and reduce the technical costs required to do so. These efforts will receive a large injection of funds, on Thursday, the Biden government announced $3.5 billion for a group of regional direct air capture centers**
The announcement follows a series of much smaller investments, starting with $22 million in 2020 and another $24 million last year, aimed at accelerating research on carbon capture technologies. As part of the bipartisan infrastructure Act signed by President Biden last November, the U.S. Department of energy also announced its carbon negative shot initiative.
Direct air capture is the process of separating carbon dioxide from ambient air. The separated carbon dioxide is then permanently stored deep underground or converted into long-lived products such as concrete to prevent its release back to the atmosphere. This is different from carbon capture systems in industrial facilities and power plants, which first prevent the release of additional emissions into the air.
The core of the plan is to deploy carbon capture technology on a gigaton scale by 2050, reducing the cost of carbon capture and storage to $100 per ton. From this perspective, 100 million tons of carbon dioxide stored underground is equivalent to the annual emissions of U.S. light fleets - equivalent to the emissions of about 250 million cars driven in a year.
The US Department of energy issued a [notice of intent] on Thursday( https://www.energy.gov/articles/biden-administration-launches-35-billion-program-capture-carbon-pollution-air-0 ) , the notice is a high-level draft until funding opportunities are officially announced later this year. The $3.5 billion fund will be used for the regional centers of these direct air capture projects. Applicants need to prove their ability to capture and store carbon from the atmosphere. The U.S. Department of energy wants these centers to permanently store one million tons of carbon dioxide a year.
"The latest UN climate report clearly points out that eliminating residual carbon pollution in the air through direct air capture and safe storage is an important 'weapon' for us to fight the climate crisis," said Jennifer Granholm, US energy secretary. "President Biden's bipartisan infrastructure law is funding new technologies that will not only make our carbon free future a reality, but also help the United States become a net zero emission leader and create high paying jobs for the transition clean energy workforce."