This paper commissioned by Carbon Market Watch and written by renowned climate economist and Senior Fellow with the Kleinman Centre for Energy Policy at the University of Pennslyvania, Danny Cullenward, examines current scientific consensus to unpack the climate value of temporary carbon storage and to identify what the minimum storage duration needs to be for them to have a perceptible climate impact.

Through explaining the compensatory and supplemental value of carbon removal use cases, and the physical and economic equivalence of climate claims Cullenward demonstrates that CO2 emissions have an effectively permanent impact on the atmosphere and oceans, that global warming depends on cumulative CO2 emissions and that temperature stabilisation depends on the timing of near-net-zero emissions.

Our companion document titled ‘Mortgaging the Atmosphere‘ provides a summary and advice for policymakers.