A new report presented in Milan shows that carbon dioxide removal (CDR) is only offsetting about 5% of global annual CO2 emissions, with 99.9% of that coming from natural methods like tree planting. Reforestation is stagnating due to land competition, while engineered solutions like direct air capture and biochar remain tiny in scale and costly, often over $200 per tonne. Scientists at the conference stressed that CDR investment and research interest have dropped since 2024, partly due to shifting political priorities. They argue that governments must treat CDR as a public good and fund it, while industry must not use it as an excuse to keep emitting. The gap between the 2 million tonnes removed last year and over 40 billion tonnes emitted shows the scale of the challenge.
