A recent article at the website CounterPunch titled, “Al Gore Puts Down ‘Climate Realism,’” responding to a TED talk given by Al Gore, says that carbon capture and storage and direct air carbon capture are “like fool’s gold,” which neither reduces the carbon content of the air to a meaningful degree nor does so in a cost-effective way. This is true, though not in the way or for the reasons CounterPunch writers articulated.
There are many nonsensical and false claims in the CounterPunch post; to address them all, but we will focus on the post’s very interesting claims about carbon capture and storage, and direct air capture.
CounterPunch writer Robert Hunziker says that one of the ways the fossil fuel industry tries to convince people that the fuels that built and maintain modern civilization are useful and good, is by claiming that “carbon capture and storage and direct air capture and recycling of plastics will handle everything.”
Hunziker quotes Al Gore as saying “These things are much better at capturing politicians than they are at capturing emissions!” He then goes on to claim that if carbon capture is “inefficient, the ‘climate realism’ argument is destroyed.”
This is true insofar as it addresses the climate “realists” who still think that carbon dioxide is a pollutant and worth removing from the air, which this website (Climate Realism) in particular does not agree with. Indeed, if climate apologists in the oil industry and other industries that invest in credits generated by direct air capture are right and carbon dioxide is a problem that needs addressing, and carbon capture and storage (CCS) is the way to go, then their argument is ruined if carbon capture is a farce.
If CCS does not actually accomplish what proponents claim at realistic costs, then their argument is destroyed. CounterPunch and Hunziker are right.
This is not the argument that most “climate realists” make, however. CCS is a scam, for the reasons Hunziker addresses, but also because it is unnecessary. Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant, and there is nothing wrong with using fossil fuels.
“Carbon capture cannot physically costs-effectively reduce emissions,” Hunziker writes, then cites an article posted by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, among others, to show that carbon capture is inefficient and costly.
This is true.
A Heartland Institute study from January of this year (2025) demonstrated how nothing about CCS is worth the current trend of government-funded CCS companies being able to use eminent domain to take private land in order to install CCS pipelines. CCS projects are not profitable on their own. According to the study, “the overall CCS process can cost up to $144 per metric ton,” not including the initial capital investment of a commercial scale project, which can cost billions. The Heartland study estimates that global expenses on CCS projects as of 2023 were around $20 billion, with up to $200 billion worth of projects approved.
Unfortunately, members of both the Republican and Democrat parties in the United States advocate for subsidizing CCS projects heavily to the tune of billions of taxpayer dollars. As explained in this Climate Realism post, the majority of government Research & Development dollars given to coal companies by the government is earmarked for CCS and other net-zero aims. While both trees and carbon capture technologies play a role in removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, trees are generally considered more efficient at carbon sequestration due to their lower cost, self-powered nature, and established presence as a natural carbon sink. Simply plant more trees if you want to capture carbon dioxide directly out of the air.
CCS at the power plant level makes electricity more expensive by necessity due to the amazingly high cost of installing and using the energy-intensive equipment, and retrofits on plants can reduce the output of a coal power plant by up to 28 percent.
There is one situation in which carbon capture is not a scam, and that is Carbon Capture Utilization – in which captured gas is injected to help stimulate oil production in Enhanced Oil Recovery operations. Climate activists and sympathetic media are unsurprisingly not appreciative of this use.
Where CounterPunch and climate realists really differ on this point is this: CCS isn’t only expensive and inefficient, it is unnecessary. Carbon dioxide emissions are not causing a climate emergency; weather is not getting more extreme, and none of the alleged “tipping points” we’ve been warned about for decades are any closer to being crossed, despite media claims.
In the end, CounterPunch is correct to point out that CCS is a scam, it absolutely is, and is a massive waste of billions of dollars. They missed the main reason, though, and that is that it is totally unnecessary. In no way does rejecting carbon capture and storage “put down” Climate Realism; Al Gore and CounterPunch will need to find another strategy.
I can’t tell if the editors of CounterPunch are Trotskyites or Maoists. But they do come
across as normal environmentalists, which
says quite a lot about environmentalists.
We have lots of deserts. Add water presto
Pheonix.
CO2 capture is only useful if the contained CO2 is a saleable item, for a specific purpose.
But there are other, more efficient and cheaper ways of making saleable contained CO2.
So its all just a totally pointless exercise.
Maybe I shouldn’t say this out loud, but as everyone knows many greenhouse operators boost carbon dioxide concentrations in their greenhouses. The equipment they use to do this are just unvented natural gas or propane burners. They are far cheaper to operate than devices that can concentrate atmospheric CO2. They also heat with virtually 100% efficiency and are run mostly at night.
A long ago acquaintance used to run some 40 greenhouse. Yes, he used natural gas, iirc.
Point is there are a lot of good uses for bottled CO2..
Sequestration is NOT one of them.
Very true, but where does the bottled CO2 come from? Hint, same place CO2 used in greenhouses. Burn NG, cool to condense and remove H2O, bottle the remaining pure CO2.
Carbon dioxide sequestration along with feeding the world’s cattle herd Bovaer® to reduce methane emissions are beyond stupid. Regulations to reduce nitrous oxide are even more stupid than that.
Lewis Carroll had it right, but his Mad Hatter and March Hare are a mere shadow of the rank madness of the real life characters prancing across the screen of reality today.
Swift had it right. Laputa barely looks like a satire today. Including its academics.
“CCS is a scam, for the reasons Hunziker addresses, but also because it is unnecessary. Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant, and there is nothing wrong with using fossil fuels.”
Exactly
Every soda, beer, and sparkling wine should have a gizmo to capture the bubbles. This would reduce the tipsiness of the consumers. I don’t think Gaia will notice.
“This would reduce the tipsiness of the consumers”
True.. unbubbly beer is yuck..
But I don’t think the CO2 has any affect on the actions of alcohol on the human body.
In my experience, its just as easy to get drunk on real wine, as opposed to sparkling wine. 😉
The Climate Liars can’t decide which way to go on CCS. The UN mentions it as one strategy in reaching their moronic fantasy land idea of “Net Zero”. Yet Al “mom-jeans” Gore bashes it, and tries to claim that climate realists are somehow enthralled with it. Maybe they should make up their minds.
Bruce:
McKinsey Corp. & Bloomberg NEF [both which scored the costs of NetZero by 2050] mentioned that to get to the required CO2 goals approximately 50% of the CO2 drop would need to be by CCS. Its not just an option, it’s crucial to the whole plan
.
Of course the NetZero plan is unnecessary on science grounds as Lennea outlines, but also is delusional on economic, social and political concerns.
As a reminder, their estimated costs for the world were $270 trillion & $200 trillion, respectively.
Renewable energy [wind/solar] is a vampire on the grid: hopefully Trump will be able to drive a wooden stake through its heart!
Google”amount of CO2 produced per kWh electricity”
a recent U.S. Environmental Protection Agency calculator estimates that the average US electricity generation produces 823.1 pounds of CO2 equivalent per MWh
=> Producing 2-3MWh therefore releases 1646.2 to 2469.3 lb of carbon
Google”carbon capture how much energy is needed”
estimates ranging from 2 to 3 megawatt-hours (MWh) of energy needed to capture and compress one tonne of CO2.
=>One metric ton translates to 2204.6lb
These numbers seem to indicate that after generating electricity the energy needed to capture CO2 can produce more CO2 than it is captured (this statement needs to be scrutinized as it is not clear if electric energy is used to capture the CO2 or a lower form of energy and apparently the best systems might be able to use less energy during capture than needed during production,but I am sceptical about this statement as for example the energy needed for the device and storage needs to be factored in correctly)
Regardless, CCS seems to drop the efficiency of energy production significantly and thus contradicting the simplest economic rules of how to deal with a very limited resource!
All this talk about “for our children!” needs to include a statement if why alarmist plan to burn more than double the amount of oil and coal than necessary! In particular since a reduction of the oil and coal consumption would lead to a quite fast natural removal of CO2 from the atmosphere, even the ever changing carbon models used in the global climate models says that more than 70% of the atmospheric CO2 diffuses into the ocean with a time constant if about 7 years..
It would be quite easy and fast to turn the carbon levels back to 20years ago if so desired
Three words:
Lake Nyos Disaster.
One word –
And?
Michael you’re smart enough to know what Mary means.
“Filtered, CO2-free air is released into the
atmosphere”
Excellent. Now all the plants can starve to death.
GHE believers win! Everybody dies!
In 50-100 years, we will need to add CO2 to the air to maintain the high plant growth rate.
Nuclear fission used to break down limestone. 🙂
From the article:”There is one situation in which carbon capture is not a scam,…”
There is at least one other that is not a scam, growing food. Making steel also captures a carbon atom.
But they don’t really mean “carbon capture” do they?
Don’t worry, very soon someone will “debnuk” CounterPunch. And triumphantly conclude that this nonsense is not a scam, of course.
Are you sure debnukking by amateurs is legal without proper authorisation?
Very nice Linnea.