“The technology exists — what has always been lacking is effective policy,” he said. “The failure has been policy, not technology — we know how to do this.” The companies that profit from extracting fossil fuels — oil, gas and coal producers around the world — should be paying for an equivalent quantity of carbon dioxide to be stored geologically as a condition of being allowed to operate, he argued.
Allen is a co-author, along with four other scientists from Oxford, the US and the Netherlands, of a paper published on Thursday in the journal Environmental Research Letters that sets out how such an “extended producer responsibility” could work. Under a “carbon takeback obligation,” all fossil fuels extracted or imported into a nation or group of nations would be offset by storing underground an amount of carbon dioxide equivalent to that generated by that fuel. Phased in over time, it could be used to store 100% of emissions by 2050, to help the world reach net zero.
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