Mitigation of Climate Change through Direct Air Capture of CO2: An Analysis of Three Plausible Scenarios in the United States

Negative emissions technologies are rapidly becoming an essential tool in the fight against climate change, and direct air capture (DAC) is one of the most logical and feasible of those technologies. DAC is the process of containing CO2 that comes from ambient air, rather than any specific source, and then either using or storing it. DAC plants can be located almost anywhere, so their placement and use should be based on the combination of economics and policy that allows the plant to be the most successful. This paper will argue that DAC is a viable option to be a major part of the United States’ climate response. It will illustrate this thesis using three potential scenarios for DAC deployment at scale: in the Pacific Northwest, the Southwest, and Appalachia.