Stay ConnectedReversing Climate Change is a podcast about carbon removal and climatetech that keeps wandering off into literature, history, philosophy, theology, and geopolitics on the theory that the technical and scientific questions stop making much sense without them. Hosted by Ross Kenyon, who did not go past a year of political philosophy PhD coursework and has visibly not let it go.
Paid subscriptions live on Substack @ https://rosskenyon.com.
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Copyright: © Nori
We primarily talk about pulling carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and ocean and storing it. But there are some places where we should actually be using it productively. Is graphite for lithium-ion batteries one of those places?
Makoto Eyre is the Founder and CEO of Homeostasis, a Tacoma-based company making graphite from carbon dioxide. In the future they aim to colocate their reactors with carbon capture and/or removal to create a modular and distributed system of graphite production.
Before the Industrial Revolution we had artisanal production and cottage industries. Then we had centralization and automation. What will production look like when centralization is no longer necessary to provide the economies of scale we had always thought it needed?
The conventional ways graphite is produced is also not so ecologically-inclined. What if the future were both simpler on supply chains and ecology?
This Episode's Sponsors
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This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/357-making-graphite-from-carbon-removal-af0
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Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
When you think of Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, you probably aren't thinking about carbon removal. But should you be?
Today's guest is Victoria Harvey, CDR Strategy Lead at ClimeFi. ClimeFi just structured the world's first Article 6.2 international transfer of durable carbon removal credits between Norway and Switzerland, and there's a lot to discuss!
What is the relationship between corporate climate action and national obligations? Do NDCs (Nationally Determined Contributions) impact corporate net-zero targets? Can corporate action satisfy national goals? Does that somehow leave us double-counting carbon removal?
This and so many more questions about the mechanics of CDR and climate action get discussed! Tune in to learn more and hear about ClimeFi's important work.
This Episode's Sponsors
Arbonics
Fill out the 2025 CDRjobs Salary Survey HERE
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
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"CDR Market Review: trends and transactions that shaped Q2 2025" blogpost from ClimeFi
CDR Market Review: Q2 2025 report from ClimeFi
Mr. Show's "Pre-Taped Call-In Show" sketch
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/356-the-worlds-first-international-295
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
Many a business was launched in carbon credits trying to fix a conflict of interest problem. Has Absolute Climate cracked the code? Should registries get out of the methodology development business?
Peter Minor, CEO and Co-Founder of Absolute Climate, is on the show today to talk about the many issues of trying to create an ultimate standard in carbon removal (hence the amazing xkcd meme), and how he thinks the current system is set up to fail.
Are we doomed to always face conflicts of interest? Do we inevitably end up thinking not in terms of ultimate design victory, but balance of power? Is it all just "a dogfight in the Wild West?" Can we all agree upon the same standard?
Listen in to Peter and Ross think the big thoughts and try to white hat hack the system to advance CDR.
This Episode's Sponsors
Fill out the 2025 CDRjobs Salary Survey HERE
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
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"Never complain, never explain"
The Civil Law Tradition by John Henry Merryman and Rogelio Pérez-Perdomo
"Common law" article on Wikipedia
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/355-is-a-carbon-credit-registry-creating-7d2
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
Salary is touchy. It's tied up with shame on all sides: are we being underpaid? Did we overpay for someone that is unfair? Is it too late to fix it?!
Today, host Ross Kenyon monologues about the 2025 Salary Survey from the folks at CDRjobs (which you should go fill out right now!), and shares some lessons he learned about designing HR policies the hard way and from experienced colleagues.
The main lesson is: you're never designing a policy for just one case. That's just the first precedent that will determine how current and future employees try to make sense of a companys policies. Sometimes what can be fair for one can be unfair to many, and vice versa. Wisdom is knowing the difference, and wisdom unfortunately isn't neatly fit upon a bumper sticker.
Anyways, get ready for a thinking show with some anecdotes and a clear call to action!
This Episode's Sponsors
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
Use this affiliate link to use Riverside to record your podcasts
Sign up for the 9Zero climate coworking space with my referral code
Resources
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Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/354-why-you-should-fill-out-the-2025-9ab
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
The Carbon Removal XPRIZE has been a major focal point of the CDR industry for years. And Mati Carbon just won the $50M Grand Prize. How did they do it, and how did their surprising and counterintuitive approach to enhanced rock weathering win over so many other contestants?
Shantanu Agarwal is the Founder and CEO of Mati Carbon, and he's on the show today to discuss how the various novel ways they went to market against the advice of others all added up to being an XPRIZE winner.
Sometimes being mission-driven means breaking all of the other rules!
This Episode's Sponsors
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
Use this affiliate link to use Riverside to record your podcasts
Sign up for the 9Zero climate coworking space with my referral code
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Email Mati: contact@mati.earth
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/353-winning-the-carbon-removal-xprize-cc6
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
Everyone thinks of national and international governments leading or failing on climate change. But what about cities and smaller political entities? How can they lead on climate and carbon removal when larger entities may be focused elsewhere? Since carbon removal infrastructure is likely to end up at least partially within urban or periurban environments, how can we prepare ourselves and our policies for such a near-term future?
To answer these and so many more questions, Christiaan Gevers Deynoot, the Founder and Program Lead of the City CDR Initiative joins host Ross Kenyon (who also serves as a Strategic Advisor, Communications for the City CDR Initiative.)
This becomes a discussion about the big questions of political order, whether we prefer bottom-up experimentation and ferment or top-down legibility and scale, and to what degree the agony and the ecstasy of central planning may be present for CDR at the municipal level.
This show gets highly philosophical and highly practical, which is a terrific combination when one can get it!
This Episode's Sponsors
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
Use this affiliate link to use Riverside to record your podcasts
Sign up for the 9Zero climate coworking space with my referral code
Resources
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City CDR Initiative on Linkedin
James C. Scott's Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed
Haussmann's renovation of Paris
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/352-how-cities-will-lead-on-carbon-33d
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
Carbon removal isn't that old. So for someone who's been involved in it for almost fifteen years... that's an elder. And today he's bringing the wisdom he earned the hard way.
Dave Addison is formerly the Virgin Earth Challenge Manager, an effort he began working on in 2010. That's about six years before I had even heard of CDR, so a long time indeed!
Last year, Dave started Planetary Practitioners, a consultancy founded on a long-run vision of helping much more of humankind access decent work in net-positive industries. You can read his writing and keep up with his work here.
One pattern you might notice in shows is that many of the lessons aren't merely about commercial strategy or TRL or unit economics. Much of the best advice is how to walk upon the Earth in a way that shows you belong here. So today, it's more emotional than average. For those of you who want or need such an experience, it is here for you, and I hope you enjoy this conversation with my good friend, Dave.
This Episode's Sponsors
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
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Sign up for the 9Zero climate coworking space with my referral code
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"Keep Going", from Dave's Substack for Planetary Practitioners
Carl Sagan's Cosmos: A Personal Voyage
David Grinspoon's Earth in Human Hands: Shaping Our Planet's Future
"It's Just a Ride" by Bill Hicks
"The Darmine Doggy Door" from I Think You Should Leave
Charlie Chaplin's speech from The Great Dictator
N.B. The meme thumbnail is not original content and is intended for thematic discussion in this episode and its accompanying bonus episode, and is just a common theme whenever Dave and I chat.
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/351-the-virgin-earth-challenge-and-c0f
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
Should every dollar spent in carbon removal be maximally catalytic? Or is it okay to try to get a really good deal for your net-zero target? What even is this industry for?!
Joining the show today—somehow for the first time ever—is Robert Höglund, a long-time CDR-watcher and writer; Co-Founder of the carbon removal's data repository-of-record, CDR.fyi, and the Head of CDR at Milkywire.
Robert endures a barrage of questions about how his thinking on carbon removal has changed over the years, and him and host Ross Kenyon try to ferret out what it actually means to be catalytic. Is carbon accounting just for knuckleheads? The truth... may surprise you.
This Episode's Sponsors
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
Use this affiliate link to use Riverside to record your podcasts
Resources
Become a paid subscriber of Reversing Climate Change
Robert Höglund's website for his advisory work
Robert Höglund's many articles
"Collective Action Problem" on Wikipedia
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/350-robert-hoglund-presents-the-many-6da
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
Everyone's focused on carbon credit offtakes and Voluntary Carbon Market purchases, but the compliance markets represent the vast majority of carbon assets in circulation. How do these markets work, and how might carbon removal interact with them in the future?
Mike Azlen is the CEO and CIO of Carbon Cap Management LLP, a firm which trades within various compliance markets.
We discuss why private traders like his company can help price discovery in compliance markets, and address some common criticisms of market-based approaches to climate change (both VCM and compliance markets.)
Carbon removal is going to figure into various compliance markets in the future, but how exactly will that work? Might that be the demand boost that carbon removal needs to scale?
There is also bonus content from this episode about some of Mike's observations about VCM failures. It will be released on Saturday, May 24th. Become a paid subscriber to access it when it is published!
This Episode's Sponsor
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
Use this affiliate link to use Riverside to record your podcasts
Resources
Become a paid subscriber of Reversing Climate Change
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/349-how-will-carbon-dioxide-removal-39c
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
Seemingly everyone in carbon removal says they want more data transparency and the sharing of scientific results. Why isn't open science more present, and how can we get more of it? Could a pre-print server for CDR be part of the solution?
Today is the official launch of CDRXIV ("cee-dee-archive"), a new initiative from CarbonPlan that aims to spur scientific conversations within the carbon removal community.
On this episode, Freya Chay (the CDR Program Lead at CarbonPlan and a Member of the Advisory Board to CDRXIV) and Tyler Kukla (a CDR Research Scientist at CarbonPlan and the Content Manager for CDRXIV) are on the show to explain how pre-print servers drive progress in other scientific fields, why CDR needs one, and how it may change our industry.
If you'd like to submit data and/or a paper for publication to CDRXIV, please email hello@cdrxiv.org, or visit their submission portal here.
This Episode's Sponsor
Listen to the RCC episode with Lisett Luik from Arbonics
Become a sponsor by emailing carbon.removal.strategies[at]gmail.com
Use this affiliate link to use Riverside to record your podcasts
Resources
Become a paid subscriber of Reversing Climate Change
Resources
This episode's page on the web: https://www.rosskenyon.com/p/348-is-a-lack-of-open-science-holding-a80
Subscribe to the Reversing Climate Change Substack: https://www.rosskenyon.com/subscribe
Books from the show, at Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/shop/reversing-climate-change
My other show, Climate Workers Anonymous: https://www.climateworkersanonymous.com
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