The Carbon Removal Show – Details, episodes & analysis

What happens when an individual company bakes industry scale up into their business philosophy? In this episode, Jakob Andersen shares the “gigaton thinking” mindset that drives his company, MASH Makes, in their approach to business and biochar.

MASH Makes started as a project at the Technological University of Denmark focusing on technology that could convert various waste streams (mainly residue biomass) into different energy products. In short, MASH Makes use automated machines that are able to produce bio oil, hydrogen and electricity from agricultural waste, with the main byproduct of this process being biochar – a soil amendment that actively absorbs CO2 from the atmosphere.

Big thanks to MASH Makes for supporting this episode.

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading and all our sources, head to thecarbonremovalshow.com.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

With scaling up in mind, this episode dives into an innovative concept that could help the industry take big steps forward. Tom and Emily are joined by Jonny Gilson from Carbonaires and Professor Niall Mac Dowell from Imperial College London to discuss Carbonaires’ ideas for the future of the voluntary carbon market. 

Big thanks to Carbonaires for supporting this episode.

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading and all our sources, head to thecarbonremovalshow.com.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

Following our trip to the climate conference at Iceland Innovation Week, we wanted to explore.

Today we're trying to get to the bottom of whether Iceland is a geological and political anomaly or a real glimpse into a potential brighter future for all of us.

Many thanks to our guests in this episode:

• Sandra Ósk Snæbjörnsdóttir, Head of CO2 mineral storage at CarbFix
• Kiddi Haflidason, General Manager at VAXA Technologies Ltd
• Fannar Jónsson, Quality Manager at Blue Lagoon Iceland
• Omar Sigurbjornsson, Director Sales and Marketing at Carbon Recycling International

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading and all our sources, head to restored.cc.

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

Tickets? Booked. Microphone? Packed. Passport..?

This week we're off to Reykjavik to take part in Iceland Innovation Week's climate conference Ok, bye.

The event's name refers to the first Icelandic glacier lost to climate change, Ok-jökull and it was a chance for us to check in with some of the businesses and policymakers turning this isolated North Atlantic island into a world leader in carbon removal projects.

Thanks to this week's guests:

• Edda Konráðsdóttir, Co-Founder at Iceland Innovation Week
• Melkorka Sigríður Magnúsdóttir, Co-founder and director of Iceland Innovation Week
• Jarþrúður Ásmundsdóttir, Head of Innovation & Technology at Business Iceland
• Dirk Nuber, Managing Director at Climeworks
• Marty Odlin, CEO at Running Tide
• Seth Bannon, Founding Partner at Fifty Years
• Salka Sigurðardóttir, Negotiator for Cop26 Presidency
• Tinna Hallgrímsdóttir, Chairperson at Icelandic Youth Environmentalist Association

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading and all our sources, head to restored.cc.

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

It's our final episode from the UK Greenhouse Gas Removal Event in London and our very own Tom Previte was asked to host another panel.

This one was called "Getting it right for people and the planet" and was the conference's public facing panel, giving non-experts and newcomers a chance to learn about and ask questions on greenhouse gas removal in the UK - a perfect fit for the podcast right?

Thanks to the panel guests:

• Dr Nem Vaughan, Associate Professor in Climate Change at the University of East Anglia
• Dr Rob Bellamy, Lecturer in Climate and Society at University of Manchester and Lead on Responsible Innovation at CO2RE Hub
• Dr Amiera Sawas, Director of Programmes and Research at Climate Outreach

Thanks again to CO2RE for inviting us to take part in such an exciting event. You can find out more about the greenhouse gas removal hub at co2re.org.

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading and all our sources, head to restored.cc.

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

Today we’re at the UK Greenhouse Gas Removal Event, a gathering of researchers, policy makers and businesses, to discuss the state of carbon removal in the UK today.

CO2RE, the greenhouse gas removal hub led by Oxford University and the hosts of the event, were kind enough to ask us to host a pair of panels across the two day conference.

We caught up with friends old and new to bring you the latest expert insight on the current state of carbon removal in the country we call home.

Thanks to this episode's guests:

• Philippa Westbury, Stakeholder Manager at CO2RE
• George Hope, Communications Manager at CO2RE
• Steve Smith, Director of CO2RE
• Emily Cox, Research Associate at Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, University of Oxford
• Navraj Singh Ghaleigh, Senior Lecturer in Climate Law at University of Edinburgh
• Emma Keller, Head of Sustainability at Nestle UK&Ireland
• Sanna O'Connor-Morberg, Former Carbon Dioxide Removal Lead at Energy Transitions Commission
• Laith Whitwham, Senior Policy Officer, Industrial Decarbonisation at Aldersgate Group
• Ruth Herbert, CEO Carbon Capture and Storage Association
• Judith Thornton, Aberystwyth University
• Liz Bowles, OFC Director and Associate Director of Farming and Land Use at The Soil Association

Thanks to CO2RE for inviting us along. You can find them at co2re.org.

You can find the full Green Shoots panel, excerpts of which are included in this episode, here.

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading and all our sources, head to restored.cc.

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

We're back! And we've been busy...

Today, Tom visits the Science Museum in London to take a look at Our Future Planet, the museum's carbon removal exhibition. As carbon communicators ourselves, we were keen to find out what the Science Museum were doing to educate their guests on our favourite topic of discussion.

Tom was taken through the exhibition by its curator, Rupert Cole. Rupert took us through the items on display, the way guests experience the exhibition, and the language they use to communicate carbon removal.

The exhibition is not without controversy. Our Future Planet is sponosored by Shell and Extinction Rebellion have accused the Science Museum of assisting in the oil giant's attempts to greenwash their reputation. The Science Museum has defended the sponsorship, saying that energy companies have a significant role to play in finding solutions to the climate crisis, and that the Science Museum retains editorial control over the exhibition.

You can read the full statements of both Extinction Rebellion and the Science Museum here. and the Science Museum's sustainability policy here.

Our thanks to Rupert and the Science Museum for showing us round. Our Future Planet runs until September 11th.

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading and all our sources, head to restored.cc.

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

Now you've discovered what carbon removal is all about, what are you going to do next?

In this finale, we have brought together a mix of carbon removal-related inspiration:

• An interactive game to help us all understand the road to gigaton-scale carbon removal
• A reflection on how COP26 left the carbon removal space (spoiler - we really do need it and we really do need it now)
• An array of stories from our guests of how they found their groove in the carbon removal space
• Our top tips for how you can continue your carbon removal journey, whatever stage you're at

Thank you for tuning in to season 1 of The Carbon Removal Show - we hope you've enjoyed it as much as we've enjoyed making it! Please like, subscribe, and tell a friend (or several) about the show. Oh, and do get in touch with us on Twitter, and subscribe to our weekly newsletter.

We can't wait to join you again soon for season 2!

Many thanks to our excellent guests throughout this series. In this episode, we hear again from Aldyen Donnelly (of episode 3 fame), Harriet Rix (episode 2), Diego Saez-Gil (episode 2), Apoorv Sinha (episode 7) and Katherine Romanak (episode 5).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading, sources from the episode, and our free newsletter head to: https://restored.cc/

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

What we do about climate change may be one of the biggest questions of our generation. Everyone should be able to have their say. This means we need to start having conversations in earnest to understand how we really think and feel about carbon removal.

But these conversations about carbon removal may feel uncomfortable, a sad reflection on where we find ourselves and a dangerous distraction from the hard task of decarbonisation. How can we balance these concerns with others' hard-headed optimism to grow an industry we're all on board with?

Let's not forget too that research suggests a poor general understanding of carbon removal across the board, alongside a whole host of preconceptions about an industry that's barely off its feet. What can we learn from this?

And, of course, no conversation is free from choices around the language we use. Lingo, jargon - call it what you like, this space is full of it! And how we choose to deploy it may have real impacts for how people understand and build expectations of carbon removal (or maybe we should say "rebalancing the carbon cycle"?)

Join Emily, Emily, Tom, Tom, Mike and all their mics to take a step back and check in on how we're thinking and feeling about everything we've learnt so far.

Many thanks to our excellent guests in this episode:

• Mike Childs, Head of Science, Policy and Research at Friends of the Earth
• Emily Cox, Research Associate in environmental policy and social psychology at Cardiff University
• Tom Mansfield, Founder and Director at Pale Blue Perspective

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading, sources from the episode, and our free newsletter head to: https://restored.cc/

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.

"It's not going to take a few dozen, or a few hundred, or a couple thousand people working on this. We're going to need many more people working on this." (Marcius Extavour)

These days, we talk about carbon removal at the scale of tonnes - hundreds...even thousands of them. Over the coming decades, we will likely need to be talking at the scale of billions. So how do we get there?

And how can a young carbon removal business progress from "one small step" to many giant leaps towards healing humankind's climate conundrum?

In this episode, join Emily and Tom as we ponder a new carbon removal business, and search for the support that could get it off the ground. Marcius from XPRIZE lets us in on how we can get our slice of Elon Musk's $100m pie; Patricia from the Carbon Removal Centre opens our eyes to a community raring to go; and Brennan from Patch gives us the key to unlock the potential of carbon marketplaces. Let the air mining rush begin...

Many thanks to our excellent guests in this episode:

• Marcius Extavour, Vice President, Energy & Climate at XPRIZE
• Patricia Silva, Co-founder and Non-Executive Director at the Carbon Removal Centre & Investment and Deal Management at Green Angel Syndicate
• Brennan Spellacy, Co-founder and CEO of Patch

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To learn more about The Carbon Removal Show, including further reading, sources from the episode, and our free newsletter head to: https://restored.cc/

Thanks to Patch for sponsoring the podcast.

And thanks to Cofruition for consulting on and producing the show.