Clean Carbon selected to attend joint DECC/RCUK greenhouse gas removal (GGR) climate engineering workshop
On 28 April, Clean Carbon member, Paul Rouse attended the joint DECC/RCUK greenhouse gas removal (GGR) climate engineering workshop held in London.
Key stakeholders, The Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and the Met Office invited applications to attend the workshop with a view to:
• identifying key research questions in GGR in the remits of the organising bodies; and,
• defining the scope of a potential joint research programme linking together key research areas to deliver integrated interdisciplinary approach.
From the many who applied, around 70 applicants were selected including physical, natural and social scientists and individuals from the business, policy and performing arts communities. Paul was one of only six social scientists present. By far the largest group were the natural scientists. There were eight discussion groups which meant that social scientists and other non-natural scientists were thinly spread which may have diluted the objective of ‘focusing on interdisciplinary engagement and discussion around how developed and developing countries might achieve large-scale, net removal of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, considering the feasibility (technical, environmental, socio-economic and legal) of specific approaches and associated research needs.’
The agencies hope that future investment will use a sophisticated interdisciplinary approach that brings together all the available evidence from across the different sciences for both national climate and energy policies to determine which techniques are possible and at what scale. They expect this interdisciplinary approach to include environmental scientists, engineers, agriculturalists, social scientists, economists, arts and humanities researchers and both academia and the private sector.
The detailed report of the discussions, feedback and recommendations is available below