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The holidays are in full swing, and as we reflect on 2021, we must acknowledge overwhelming climate impacts experienced by California communities. This year was an inflection point, with many Californians concerned about climate change. The good news is the new year brings new possibilities, including a little known but rapidly emerging climate opportunity for the Central Valley.

Underneath the Central Valley are rock structures well-suited for storing large amounts of carbon dioxide for a long time (close to California’s 2017 electricity emissions per year for 1,000 years). Storing carbon in deep underground rock formations is a climate tool known as geologic carbon storage. The Central Valley has one of the country’s largest geologic carbon storage potentials, presenting a major climate opportunity. Geologic storage is also valuable for enabling powerful climate solutions like direct air capture (DAC) and bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS), which remove carbon from the atmosphere.

Carbon removal is vital to limit global warming, and responsible DAC and BECCS projects can provide co-benefits, including jobs and ecosystem services. Historically fossil-fuel-dependent Central Valley communities, which produce more than 70% of the state’s oil, could especially benefit. As California transitions from fossil fuels, new carbon removal industry jobs may employ similar skills in construction, maintenance, transportation, and operation. Valley agricultural communities could also benefit. The ag sector produces more than a quarter of the nation’s food and generates considerable agricultural waste biomass, which is often disposed of harmfully. Instead, BECCS projects could use agricultural waste as feedstocks, supporting local energy generation and economic opportunities. BECCS projects can also reduce flooding and revitalize agricultural land.

While ripe opportunities, DAC and BECCS advancement must center environmental justice to secure benefits and avoid harms for all. To date, conflation with other technologies, industry involvement, moral hazard, and scientific gaps have been key tension points. And while geologic storage processes have existed for decades, relatively-low but manageable risks like groundwater contamination and tremors remain. DAC can be energy-intensive, and health implication gaps remain for some of the chemicals used; BECCS can require lots of land and energy, and could harm local air quality without safeguards.

Despite challenges, the Central Valley’s suitability for co-location of carbon removal facilities with geologic storage sites can drastically reduce transportation and infrastructure needs. Furthermore, the carbon removal field is nascent enough to ensure variations of justice are incorporated and communities shape project implementation. To benefit Valley communities, projects must consider more than carbon removed, including social, economic, and environmental outcomes, as well as align with community priorities like equitable land use, clean air and water access, oil and gas reforms, community empowerment, and other efforts championed by community-based Valley organizations.

Government involvement in DAC and BECCS is growing. The California Air Resources Board’s 2022 climate change scoping plan update includes DAC and BECCS. The enacted infrastructure bill contains billions of dollars for DAC facilities, and the Department of Energy launched the Carbon Negative Shot to accelerate carbon removal. Carbon removal is becoming a large part of climate plans, and as momentum grows, so does urgency for communities to discuss carbon removal and its role for the Central Valley.

The Valley is already experiencing extreme heat, droughts, wildfires, and floods, growing energy burdens, and decreasing agricultural productivity. On top of existing pollution burdens and inequities, climate change threatens Valley communities, especially our communities of color and low-income.

Undoubtedly, climate action is imperative for Central Valley livelihoods, and carbon removal should play a meaningful role, but climate math cannot be an excuse to fast-track solutions. For a truly just and prosperous carbon removal field, we need a bottom-up approach championed by front-line communities like those of California’s Central Valley.

Vanessa Suarez Contributed

This story was originally published December 7, 2021, 10:05 AM.