Yuting Zhang, Christopher Jackson and Samuel Krevor, researchers from Imperial College London, explore the feasibility of achieving gigatonne-scale CO₂ storage by mid-century. In their paper The feasibility of reaching gigatonne scale CO₂ storage by mid-century, published in Nature Communications (2024), they apply a logistics model to assess global CO₂ storage potential, proposing a feasible benchmark for future projections.

Using a geographically resolved growth model, the study evaluates the feasibility of scaling up CO₂ storage while considering geological and deployment constraints. The findings suggest that a maximum global storage rate of 16 GtCO₂ yr^-1 by 2050 is possible, but highly dependent on the United States contributing 60% of the total. A more realistic benchmark, aligned with government technology roadmaps, estimates a global storage rate of 5-6 GtCO₂ yr^-1, with the US contributing around 1 GtCO₂ yr^-1.

The authors challenge the rate of more than 6 GtCO₂ yr^-1 (the full range is 1-30 GtCO₂ yr^-1) projections in the Sixth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – AR6, and argue that the AR6 overestimates deployment feasibility in China, Indonesia, and South Korea. They highlight geological, geographical, and techno-economic constraints that have been overlooked, suggesting that the AR6 projections may be overly optimistic.

This research is available open access. Read the full paper here.