Thread by @DrSimEvans

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Graphical summary THREAD
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Can we limit warming to 1.5C without negative emissions from BECCS?

I wrote about this new research, which explores the alternatives…

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

Here's a typical pathway to 1.5C. You'll notice it has *a lot* of negative emissions from BECCS (the blue bits on the chart).

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

This new research looked at a bunch of ways to minimise the need for BECCS. Stuff like, oh, cultured meat, flying less, etc

Each of them cuts the need for BECCS, but is fairly ambitious – and you have to combine them *all* to eliminate BECCS…

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

Here's some more details on those ambitious alternatives for cutting emissions and relying less on negative emissions from BECCS…

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

One interesting feature: Things like lifestyle change, agricultural intensification and cutting non-CO2 emissions (like methane from the fossil fuel industry) have the biggest impacts, in terms of needing less BECCS

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

Anyway, if you combine *all* the alternative options (mega-renewables, lifestyle change, big cuts to non-CO2 GHGs etc etc) then you can eliminate the need for BECCS. This may be unrealistic…

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

OK, let's imagine we manage the "no BECCS" pathway to 1.5C. (Remember, that means we're also eating less meat, being much more efficient &etc &etc).

We no longer need **an Australia** of extra agricultural land for bioenergy. Instead, there's land to spare for forests.

Another reason there's extra land to spare in the "no BECCS" scenario is that it eliminates pretty much all bioenergy, as well – not just the stuff attached to CCS.

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

But let's not forget, these alternatives are incredibly ambitious. Example: the "high renewables" pathway has ~300EJ of energy from wind and solar…compared to maybe 5-6EJ today. That's a 50-60x scale-up (!)

What are people saying about this new research?

"Of great importance"
"A good paper & a step forward"
"Extremely useful"

But!

"The core of the mitigation challenge remains the same"

Read the full paper (£)

nature.com/articles/s4155…

Or my summary:

carbonbrief.org/world-can-limi…

That's all I've got for now!
/ENDS