CO2-removal News

Peer-reviewed Publications

Li et al. (2025): Innovative performance evaluation and process simulation of a 550 MW staged, pressurized oxy-biomass combustion power plant for negative carbon emissions

Xiangdong Li, Hui Lin, Guan Wang, Gaofeng Dai, Yongqiang Chen, Yong Luo, Bin Liu, Jiaye Zhang, Richard L. Axelbaum and Xuebin Wang, IN: Renewable Energy, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2025.124534

Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) technology is crucial for improving carbon capture efficiency but faces challenges due to high electricity costs. Staged, pressurized oxy-combustion addresses this by efficiently recovering latent heat from flue gas within the steam Rankine cycle, improving net plant efficiency in power plants. Integrating biomass with this technology holds promise for reducing fossil fuel consumption and achieving negative carbon emissions. However, the performance of staged pressurized oxy-biomass combustion (Bio-SPOC) has not been studied yet. This study used ASPEN Plus to analyze the performance of a 550 MW staged, pressurized oxy-biomass combustion power plant.

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Peer-reviewed Publications

Crafoord et al. (2025): Permanent storage of carbon dioxide in mafic rock formations: exploring Sweden’s potential

Emelie Crafoord, Christina Wanhainen and Glenn Bark, IN: Frontiers in Climate, https://doi.org/10.3389/fclim.2025.1685187

Mineral carbonation in reactive bedrock offers a rapid and permanent method for carbon dioxide (CO₂) sequestration, converting CO₂ into stable mineral phases within a geologically short timeframe. This study presents the first-ever systematic assessment of onshore CO₂ mineral storage potential in Sweden, based on fieldwork, sampling, and mineralogical and geochemical analyses conducted at 23 localities. While this theoretical assessment cannot resolve uncertainties related to reactivity, dissolution capacity, and sequestration efficiency, it provides a critical foundation for identifying potentially favorable storage reservoirs.

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Peer-reviewed Publications

Liu et al. (2025): Contrasting soil organic carbon sequestration mechanisms in intertidal and supratidal habitats of coastal wetlands divided by seawalls

Jiayuan Liu, Ning Zhang, Xinyu Miao, Zhen Xu, Tianyu Zhang, Ying Wei, Hailong Wu and Fude Liu, IN: Journal of Cleaner Production, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2025.146636

Soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration in coastal wetlands is crucial for mitigating global climate change. However, coastal seawall construction alters habitats, potentially affecting the carbon sequestration potential. This study analyzed the content, distribution patterns, and dynamics of SOC and dissolved organic matter (DOM) in two seawall-protected coastal wetlands in the Yellow River Delta, comparing inside (supratidal habitat) and outside (intertidal habitat) habitats.

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Peer-reviewed Publications

Nature – Gall et al. (2025): Strategic land reallocation enhances carbon sequestration and biodiversity protection without compromising agricultural productivity in Great Britain

Sarah S. Gall, Tom Harwood, Michael Obersteiner and Jim W. Hall, IN: Communications Earth & Environment, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-025-02728-w

Due to the negative environmental consequences of current land-use, and land’s important role regarding carbon, biodiversity and food security, there is an urgent interest in reforming land-use. Policy objectives for tree planting to sequester carbon and the protection of land to increase biodiversity require land reallocation, which leads to inevitable trade-offs. Here, the authors evaluate the trade-offs between three objectives for rural land: agricultural/forestry production, carbon sequestration and biodiversity, by calculating metrics for these three objectives on a 500 m grid covering Great Britain. They use a multi-objective optimisation that allows them to explore the full option space of possible land conversions and identify the land allocations that entail limited trade-offs.

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Peer-reviewed Publications

Nature – Patil et al. (2025): Differential impacts of regenerative agriculture practices on soil organic carbon: a meta-analysis of studies from India

Mukund Patil, Cuba Perumal, Pushpajeet Choudhari, Rajesh Pasumarthi, Gajanan Sawargaonkar and Ramesh Singh, IN: Scientific Reports, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-12149-6

Regenerative agriculture (RA) is heralded as a transformative solution to combat climate change, enhance biodiversity, and improve soil health. However, its effectiveness across diverse agro-climatic contexts remains underexplored. This meta-analysis synthesizes results from 147 peer-reviewed studies across India’s major agro-ecological and agro-climatic regions. Using a random-effects model, the authors estimate the soil organic carbon (SOC) change attributable to a suite of RA practices, including organic amendments (farmyard manure, green manure, compost, and biochar), conservation tillage, crop residue retention, and fertilizer management.

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Peer-reviewed Publications

Araujo & Santos (2025): Soil Calcimetry Dynamics to Monitor Weathering Flux: Method Calibration in Wollastonite-Amended Croplands – Preprint

Francisco SM Araujo and Rafael M Santos, IN: Preprints.org, doi: 10.20944/preprints202509.2142.v1

Enhanced Rock Weathering (ERW) is a promising carbon dioxide removal (CDR) strategy that accelerates mineral dissolution, sequestering atmospheric CO₂ while improving soil health. This study builds on prior applications of soil calcimetry by investigating its ability to resolve short-term carbonate fluxes and rainfall-modulated weathering dynamics in wollastonite-amended croplands. Conducted over a single growing season (May–October 2024) in temperate row-crop fields near Port Colborne, Ontario—characterized by lacustrine clay soils and variable rainfall—the study tests whether calcimetry can differentiate between dissolution and precipitation phases and serve as a proxy for total weathering flux within the sentinel layer.

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Science-Policy Documents

Du et al. (2025): Multiphase carbonation engineering of RCA via CO₂-enriched cement slurry treatment: Mechanistic insights into carbonation efficiency and asphalt pavement performance enhancement

Xiaotong Du, Kui Hu, Jiahao Zhang, Jia Li, Giuseppe Carlo Marano and Tingyi Zhang, IN: Construction and Building Materials, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2025.143722

The growing demand for sustainable pavement materials necessitates innovative approaches to enhance recycled concrete aggregates (RCA), whose surface defects critically undermine asphalt bonding performance. Given its high porosity and loosely bound structure, calcium silicate hydrate (C-S-H) is identified as the primary factor undermining RCA performance and thus the key target of modification. This study proposes a CO₂-enriched cement slurry treatment under ambient conditions to engineer the RCA microstructure through controlled carbonation of C-S-H. The treatment integrates three mechanistic pathways: hydration-induced hardening of unhydrated cement phases, carbonation curing of setting slurry, and targeted carbonation of residual microstructural pores on the RCA surface.

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Peer-reviewed Publications

Zhu et al. (2025): Quantifying asynchrony between microbial necromass and soil organic carbon for sustainable soil carbon management

Xuefeng Zhu, Joshua Schimel, Chao Liang, IN: Soil Biology and Biochemistry, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soilbio.2025.109950

Microbial products and residues are crucial for soil organic carbon (SOC) formation, ecosystem health, and global climate regulation. Central to this understanding is the concept of the soil Microbial Carbon Pump (MCP), which highlights the role of microbial-derived carbon in SOC transformation and sequestration. Despite the rapid growth in research recognizing the significance of the MCP in SOC storage, direct assessments grounded in the MCP concept have largely lagged behind. Here, the authors distill important aspects of soil MCP assessment by reviewing relevant literature, showcasing model scenarios, and exploring rational perspectives on sustainable soil carbon management.

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Peer-reviewed Publications

Suhrhoff et al. (2025): Aggregated monitoring of enhanced weathering on agricultural lands – Preprint

Tim Jesper Suhrhoff, Anu Khan, Shuang Zhang, Beck J Woollen, Tom Reershemius, Mark A. Bradford, Alexander Polussa, Ella Milliken, Peter A. Raymond, Chris Reinhard, Noah Planavsky, IN: CDRXiv, https://doi.org/10.70212/cdrxiv.2025394.v1

Terrestrial enhanced weathering (EW) on agricultural land is a promising carbon dioxide removal (CDR) pathway with high potential to scale. Enhanced weathering also has the potential to provide significant agronomic co-benefits to farmers and producers. Today, most EW field trials are funded through the voluntary carbon market (VCM) with the purpose of generating carbon removal credits for corporate sustainability goals. As a result, monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) frameworks for EW are designed for attribution of tons of removal via weathering to individual fields. Here, the authors describe approaches for aggregation of weathering indicators across multiple fields using aqueous, solid, and gas phase measurements.

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