The world’s largest direct air capture plant will soon start removing planet-warming pollution from the atmosphere — a significant step for a once-sci-fi technology that could hold a key to taking on climate change. But while the so-called Mammoth plant in Iceland is unprecedented in scale, it is small compared with what would be needed to walk humanity back from the climate ledge. The plant will use fans, filters, piping and geothermal energy to permanently remove up to 36,000 metric tons of carbon from the atmosphere each year, writes Corbin Hiar. That’s less than 1 percent of the annual emissions of a typical coal-fired power plant. More than 200 coal plants were operating in the U.S. as of 2022. Still, the opening is a significant development for an industry that scientists agree will likely be necessary to meet the Paris Agreement’s goals to limit global warming. Mammoth also isn’t the only new kid on the block. The direct air capture company Holocene is launching its first industrial-scale pilot facility Wednesday in Knoxville, Tennessee. In West Texas, Occidental Petroleum is building a direct air capture plant designed to remove up to 500,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually. Occidental is part of a group selected by the Energy Department to develop two direct air capture hubs — one in southern Texas, the other in southeastern Louisiana — capable of removing 1 million metric tons of carbon per year. Experts say removing carbon — potentially billions of metric tons per year — may be required to limit global warming to the increasingly out-of-reach goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius and stave off the worst climate impacts. But such estimates assume steep global cuts in fossil fuel production. Instead, the world is burning record amounts of coal and oil. Many climate hawks also remain skeptical of the direct carbon capture industry, given oil companies’ dominant role in the burgeoning sector. They worry that oil and gas producers will use direct air capture to justify continued production of the fossil fuels driving the global temperature rise. That fear is not unfounded. Occidental CEO Vicki Hollub recently told an industry gathering that the technology “gives our industry a license to continue to operate for the 60, 70, 80 years.”
| 
