A Research Strategy for Ocean-based Carbon Dioxide Removal and Sequestration (2022) / Chapter Skim
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2 Crosscutting Considerations on Ocean-based CDR R&D
2 Crosscutting Considerations on Ocean-based CDR R&D
Pages 39-76
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From page 39... ...
Although there has been an attempt to regulate certain ocean CDR techniques -- most notably, nutrient fertilization -- under existing international agreements, there remain significant gaps in the international legal framework. Notwithstanding the lack of international and domestic law specifically governing ocean CDR research and deployment, projects could be subject to a variety of general environmental and other laws.
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as forming part of customary international law, and thus abides by them. UNCLOS distinguishes the oceans from countries' internal waters (see Figure 2.1)
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.5 The federal government also has exclusive authority over federal waters, which extend beyond state waters, up to 200 nautical miles from the baseline. Some Native American tribes have rights to fish in U.S.
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From page 42... ...
Previous studies have considered the application of existing international law to projects involving research into, or full-scale deployment of, various ocean CDR techniques (e.g., Freestone and Rayfuse 2008; Abate and Greenlee, 2009; Verlaan, 2009; Proelss, 2012; Proelss and Hong, 2012; Kuokkanen and Yamineva, 2013; Scott, 2013; Reynolds, 2015, 2018a, 2018b; McGee et al., 2017; Brent et al., 2018; Brent et al., 2019; GESAMP, 2019; Webb et al., 2021)
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From page 43... ...
Relevant Principles of Customary International Law Several rules of customary international law could apply to research into, and full-scale deployment of, ocean CDR techniques. Previous studies (e.g., Reynolds, 2015; Brent et al., 2019)
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From page 44... ...
must be conducted for risky projects and, where the EIA confirms the potential for significant transboundary environmental damage, those potentially affected must be notified and consulted with.14 However, international law does not dictate the conduct of the EIAs or consultations, giving countries broad discretion to determine how to comply. Relevant International Agreements UNFCCC, Kyoto Protocol, and Paris Agreement The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
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The Paris Agreement does not, however, expressly require parties to engage in ocean CDR techniques or establish specific rules for their use. Convention on Biological Diversity The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD)
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(2021, p.19) concluded that this definition would encompass ocean CDR projects "undertaken for the purpose of mitigating climate change." However, they and others (e.g., Sugiyama and Sugiyama, 2010; Bodansky, 2011; Reynolds, 2018b; Brent et al., 2019)
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Countries must exercise their sovereign rights in accordance with international law, including their obligation, under customary international law, to avoid significant transboundary environmental harm. Under Articles 192 and 193 of UNCLOS, countries also have a general obligation to protect and preserve the marine environment, and must exercise their sovereign rights in accordance with that obligation.
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From page 48... ...
argue that ocean CDR techniques involving the addition of materials to ocean waters, such as ocean iron fertilization and ocean alkalinity enhancement, could themselves be considered pollution of the marine environment. Article 195 of UNCLOS requires parties, when taking steps to control pollution, to avoid merely transforming one type of pollution into another.
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From page 49... ...
but can permit the dumping of other substances.54 In contrast, parties to the London Protocol must prohibit the dumping of all substances, except eight "whitelisted" substances (identified in Annex I to the Protocol and listed in Table 2.2) , which may be dumped with a permit.55 Some ocean CDR techniques, including ocean alkalinity enhancement, nutrient fertilization, and seaweed cultivation (in some cases)
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specifies when ocean fertilization projects should be considered "dumping" for the purposes of the London Convention and Protocol. The resolution draws a distinction between research and other (nonresearch)
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, in October 2013, the parties to the London Protocol agreed to amend that instrument to establish a new regulatory framework for "marine geoengineering" defined as: a deliberate intervention in the marine environment to manipulate natural processes, including to counteract anthropogenic climate change and/or its impacts, and that has the potential to result in deleterious effects, especially where those effects may be widespread, long lasting or severe.64 The 2013 amendment provides that: Contracting Parties shall not allow the placement of matter into the sea from vessels, aircraft, platforms or other man-made structures at sea for marine geoengineering activities listed in annex 4, unless the listing provides that the activity or the subcategory of an activity may be authorized under a permit.65 Annex 4 currently only lists ocean fertilization (as defined above)
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From page 52... ...
environmental law to several ocean CDR techniques. To date, however, the researchers have only published an analysis of laws applicable to ocean alkalinity enhancement and seaweed cultivation (Webb et al., 2021)
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However, in Table 2.3, we provide a non-exhaustive list of key federal environmental laws that could have implications for the use of different ocean CDR techniques. Those laws can be divided into five broad categories as follows: • Environmental Review Laws: The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)
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From page 54... ...
There is currently no single, comprehensive legal framework for ocean CDR research or deployment, either internationally or in the United States. At the international level, while steps have been taken to regulate certain ocean CDR techniques -- most notably, ocean fertilization -- under existing international agreements, significant
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From page 55... ...
laws that could apply to different ocean CDR techniques and explore possible reforms to strengthen the legal framework to ensure that it appropriately balances the need for further research to improve understanding of ocean CDR techniques against the potential risks of such research, and put in place appropriate safeguards to prevent or minimize negative environmental and other outcomes. 2.2 SOCIAL DIMENSIONS AND JUSTICE CONSIDERATIONS Ocean CDR has a number of social dimensions -- definitions to help describe these dimensions are included in Box 2.1.
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state waters NEPAa RHAb MPRSA RHAb MPRSA RHAb CZMAa,c MPRSAd CWA CZMAa,c CWA NEPAa ESAe NEPAa NEPAa ESAe NEPAa CZMAa,c MMPAf CZMAa,c CZMAa,c MMPAf CZMAa,c ESAe NMSAg ESAe ESAe NMSAg ESAe MMPAf MSFCMAa,h MMPAf MMPAf MSFCMAa,h MMPAf NMSAg NMSAg NMSAg MPRSAd NMSAg MSFCMAa,h MSFCMAa,h MSFCMAa,h MSFCMAa,h U.S. federal waters NEPAa OCSLAi MPRSA OCSLAi MPRSA OCSLAi (within territorial sea)
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c If project could affect land or water use or natural resources in state waters. d If project involves the discharge of any material into ocean waters.
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However, what those analogs are has not been studied. The literature on social acceptance and social impacts of offshore renewable energy, offshore CCS, deep-sea extraction, aquaculture, blue carbon and payments for marine ecosystem services, and marine conservation suggests the following seven takeaways that are relevant for marine CDR: 1.
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2. Carbon removal will be only one of many factors driving change in marine environments, and its social dimensions need to be assessed in the context of blue growth and marine conservation goals to maximize co-benefits and avoid unintended harms to other goals.
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3. Perceptions of "naturalness" are important in terrestrial CDR, and could affect the acceptability of ocean CDR techniques as well as the scale at which they are deployed.
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. There are protocols to assess co-benefits: within the blue carbon sector, voluntary carbon markets have considered Climate, Community and Biodiversity Standards, and "Social Carbon" co-benefits (Cisneros-Montemayor et al., 2019)
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These considerations are important for blue carbon and kelp aquaculture, but potentially apply broadly to other CDR techniques as well -- the cheapest CDR per ton may not be the most equitable or socially beneficial.
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. Ocean carbon removal technologies will have different environmental justice implications based on how they are deployed, including the policies that support them and the actors and motivations driving them.
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. An analysis of public engagement with carbon removal found that respondents were concerned with "environmental dumping," or analogies with the dumping of polluting processes on poorer populations (McLaren et al., 2016)
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calling on the ocean community to formally recognize the traditional knowledge of Indigenous people worldwide and the commitment to establish meaningful partnerships. Ocean CDR research can build on this growing recognition of the importance of meaningful partnerships in ocean monitoring and related fields.
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These partnerships also have potential for greater impacts through a more robust knowledge of community needs now and going forward. 2.3 OTHER CROSSCUTTING CONSIDERATIONS Considerations that are also important for advancing research on ocean-based carbon removal include monitoring and verification of carbon removed and other environmental impacts, valuation of added benefits including ecosystem services, the economics of different approaches, and policy mechanisms to support research and deployment (where deemed appropriate)
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From page 67... ...
Ship expeditions, used to deploy these in situ suites of sensors, would also deploy biogeochemical Argo floats throughout the area of treatment and beyond, as well as neutrally buoyant sediment traps set to capture sediment over a range of water depths, including close to the seafloor. Approaches and scales for the application of artificial upwelling and downwelling as a carbon removal solution are in nascent stages.
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From page 68... ...
Seaweed cultivation has complexities too, especially if it is grown for multiple uses. If it is grown only for carbon sequestration in the deep sea, accounting of the carbon removal is described above in monitoring for environmental impacts and enhancements because of the dual purpose of the sensors and approaches needed.
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From page 69... ...
$1M/yr deployment also required mining and deploying minerals yr per region Artificial upwelling Satellite data; biogeo Surface bloom extents; water Existing ships, For the geographic The EXPORTS field campaign and downwelling and Argo; gliders; properties, nutrients, dissolved autonomous vehicles; area equivalent to the deployments conducted over a nutrient fertilization autonomous moorings oxygen, pCO2, sediment (capital costs for EXPORTS project, ship region of a couple of hundreds for measuring change; accumulation autonomous moorings, time $7M; data analyses, of km autonomous moorings sediment traps, biogeo research AND modeling as control; sediment Argo) = $5M support $25M traps (seafloor and mid water)
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The drivers of, and approaches to developing, robust and effective CDR policy also require further study. Looking beyond government policy, ocean CDR research and deployment (if any)
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. Whereas the treatment of ocean CDR projects under international law has been well studied, comparatively little research has explored the application of domestic law to such projects.
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While some studies have highlighted uncertainties or challenges associated with the application of existing domestic law, none has fully evaluated the need for, or utility of adopting, a new legal framework specific to ocean CDR or analyzed what such a framework should look like. Research Gaps in Social Dimensions When it comes to social dimensions, there are applicable insights from adjacent domains, but there is very little empirical research directly on ocean CDR.
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From page 73... ...
For example, the recent National Academies report on terrestrial CDR (NASEM, 2019) recommended $5 million per year for 10 years on social science research on cost-effective adaptative management of coastal blue carbon and the response of coastal land owners and managers to carbon removal and storage incentives, $1 million a year for 3 years for extension and outreach to forest landowners, $2 million a year for 3 years to study barriers to agricultural soil carbon adoption, $5 million a year for 10 years to study the social and environmental impacts of carbon mineralization, $1 million a year for 10 years on public engagement with geological sequestration, etc.
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2.1 Model international governance framework for ocean CDR How can the existing international governance framework 2–3 2–4 research for ocean CDR research be improved? Is there an alternative framework(s)
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policy makers) view and use monitoring data, including certification 2.10 Analysis of policy mechanisms and innovation pathways, What are policy options for scaling ocean CDR?
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