walk it back blog, March 27 2023
Postcards from Berlin: Putting carbon back where it came from
Airing debates around carbon removal in Berlin
In March the walk it back campaign arrived in Berlin. Given Germany’s historic leadership on the green agenda (ex Chancellor, Angela Merkel, was often referred to as the “Climate Chancellor” for her long-standing international action on emission cuts), we were looking forward to understanding how carbon removal was being integrated into Net Zero planning.
Hosted by our brilliant partners at the Open Air Collective (OAC), we heard that while the imperative of carbon removal is being talked about in lots of high level policy circles, it is still a new concept for most of the public. Chris Neidl pointed out that, just as with the solar energy revolution, it’s only once people can see and touch real projects in action that they can start understanding a topic like carbon removal.
In fact, there are a few glimpses of a new start up culture starting to emerge. In fact, one local company based in Berlin, Neo Carbon, is dramatically cutting the costs of Direct Air Capture by using existing cooling towers around Europe to capture and remove carbon at a much reduced cost. Smart, huh?
