For the successful advancement of CDR (Carbon Dioxide Removal), we believe that R&D plays a key role in this progress. The second chapter of the third edition of “The State of Carbon Dioxide Removal” analyzes the status of research and development in atmospheric capture technologies.
Why does R&D in atmospheric capture matter?
This chapter analyzes R&D in atmospheric carbon dioxide removal (CDR) technologies and stems from a key idea: fulfilling the Paris Agreement requires an unprecedented acceleration of innovation in low-carbon, neutral, and negative emissions technologies. R&D serves a dual role: in the long term, it enables CDR to reach climate-relevant scales; in the short term, it allows for the construction of a diverse portfolio of complementary methods to adapt strategies to different contexts and political preferences.
Innovation in CDR is understood as a non-linear process, with loops between basic research, demonstration, and deployment. To analyze it, the report uses three indicators: research grants (resource inputs), scientific publications (knowledge generation and dissemination), and patents (inventive activity close to commercialization). With these, the chapter shows a mixed outlook: specific funding is growing and diversifying, scientific production is increasing and shifting toward emerging methods, but the patent signal is weaker, suggesting that the leap to commercial technologies is not yet occurring at the necessary pace.
R&D Funding Directed at CDR
Between 2005 and 2025, approximately 7,300 CDR R&D grants were identified, with around 1,400 starting between 2023 and 2025, totaling about 5.6 billion USD—of which 1.9 billion USD corresponds to those final three years alone. Although the number of active projects has decreased slightly and new grants have dropped by 32%, the total volume continues to grow due to a shift toward larger projects. Throughout the period, annual CDR funding grew by an average of around 15%, higher than other low-carbon technologies, and maintained a rate close to 13% in 2023–2025, in line with the increase in publications.
Funding is highly concentrated in a few methods: soil carbon sequestration (24% of active grants in 2023–2025), biochar (18%), and afforestation/reforestation/forest management (14%). Technologies like DACCS and BECCS represent only 11% and 4% of grants respectively, but absorb 22% and 17% of funds due to their larger average size. There is also geographic concentration: historically, most funding came from North America and Europe, and in more recent years Europe has clearly taken the lead, while the remaining regions account for only a relatively small fraction. This implies a risk of a gap in CDR capabilities if R&D is not reinforced in currently underrepresented regions, especially in high-durability technologies.
Scientific Production: Mature Fields and New Frontiers
In terms of publications, the chapter registers tens of thousands of articles on CDR since 2005, with rapid growth and notable acceleration in recent years. More mature fields like biochar, forestry methods, and soil sequestration continue to expand their literature, but at more moderate rates as the accumulated volume increases.
The novelty lies in the strong growth of emerging technologies: DACCS, ocean alkalinity enhancement, and mineral products show annual increase rates well above average, a sign that they are becoming major research focal points. On the other hand, ocean fertilization and biomass burial show declines in the number of articles, though on small bases and with high uncertainty. Geographically, research is concentrated in East Asia (especially China, with leadership in biochar), Europe, and North America, while other regions gain relative weight but remain at low volumes.
Patents: Slower and Unequal Inventive Innovation
The third dimension is patent activity, used as an indicator of near-market invention. In CDR, patent families grew strongly until the early 2010s but have since shown a downward trend, in contrast to the moderate increase in climate mitigation patents in general. Collectively, patents linked to CDR represent a very small fraction of total mitigation patents.
The decline is largely explained by the retreat in BECCS patents, which once concentrated a very high portion of inventive activity and then steadily decreased. DACCS maintains a stable and significant presence, while mineral products are emerging as one of the main focuses for CDR patents, along with a gradual increase in patents regarding biochar. Although the most recent data must be interpreted with caution due to processing delays, the overall signal is that scientific R&D and funding are advancing faster than market-oriented invention, indicating that the transition from the lab to commercial deployment has not yet sufficiently accelerated.
Implications for R&D Policies
The chapter concludes that combining information from grants, publications, and patents with data on technical potentials, costs, and socio-economic contexts is key to guiding public funding and supporting the early deployment of novel CDR. Today, funding and scientific production are concentrated in a few methods and regions, while inventive activity focuses on technologies like BECCS, DACCS, and mineral products, which could create an unbalanced global CDR portfolio.
To reduce vulnerabilities, it is recommended to reinforce the diversity of methods and actors, supporting emerging technologies with high potential that remain under-explored, and to better leverage generalist R&D, ensuring that large programs on clean energy, ecosystem resilience, and advanced materials explicitly incorporate atmospheric capture objectives. With this, the science policy community can design R&D portfolios that not only increase research volume but also coherently accelerate the transition to available and scalable CDR technologies in the coming decades.
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