Germany opens consultation on negative emissions strategy – media

The German government will evaluate methods for CO2 removal and storage in its first online consultation on a planned long-term strategy for negative emissions to help deal with residual greenhouse gases that are difficult or impossible to avoid like methane from farming, according to Tagesspiegel Background.  

The consultation phase, which is open until 17 November, will consider natural CO2 removal solutions, such as forest management and reforestation or rewetting peatlands, as well as technological means like bioenergy carbon capture and storage (BECCS) and direct air carbon capture and storage (DACCS). The latter involves sucking CO2 out of the atmosphere and storing it in geological formations, for instance.  

Germany's economy ministry (BMWK) plans to refer the negative emissions strategy to the country's cabinet in early April 2025. The aim is to introduce a 2060 target for net-negative greenhouse gas emissions and interim targets for technical carbon sinks for the years 2035, 2040 and 2045. Targets for natural sinks already exist in the country's Climate Change Act (KSG), wrote Tagesspiegel Background. 

A stakeholder dialogue on the negative emissions plan was initiated parallel to a cabinet decision on the Carbon Management Strategy (CMS) and draft amendment to the CO2 Storage Act at the end of May, which opened the way for carbon capture and storage in the country.

Earlier this year, the German government said limiting global temperature rise to 1.5°C was "increasingly unlikely." It added negative emissions solutions would be needed to lower CO2 concentration in the atmosphere to limit the risk of severe and irreversible consequences from global heating. The strategy aims to set targets, evaluate different carbon removal methods and analyse economic incentives to help deploy those solutions.