Insurance and geoengineering 19
Turning to the terrestrial
Many of the geoengineering interventions mentioned above are up in the
air figuratively as well as physically. In contrast, terrestrial carbon sequestration is down to earth, if far from tried and true. ‘Technological’ versions of carbon removal, such as Carbon Capture and Storage, are often
terrestrial in the double sense of capturing CO 2 from the combustion of
once-subterranean fossil carbon (coal, oil, or gas) and related industrial
processes, then extracting, liquifying, transporting, and injecting the liquid back underground, often into empty oil and gas reservoirs. Initially
invented by the oil industry to extract remnant oil from reservoirs, CCS is
a highly energy- intensive process that, like all carbon removal methods,
relies on the assurance that it will never leak the CO 2 into the atmosphere.
It is not a confident promise. The entire value chain and production cycle
is replete with leakage risks (Guthrie & Kirrane 2017). For the insurance
industry, though, this opens up yet another risk frontier and market. As
Swiss Re (2020) beckons: ‘By 2050, billions of tons of CO 2 will need to be
stored: the front- runners among insurers will profit from the experience
gathered over the next decade.’ Insurance products for CCS are indeed
emerging.
At the same time, the possibility of catastrophic CO 2 loss (and related
human poisonings and impacts on the climate) threatens to limit the new
market. There is a non-negligible likelihood of mass CO 2 release caused by
seismic activity, especially given that such instability seems to be exacerbated by both climate change and the injection of liquids into geological
formations, as CCS does (Buis 2019; Masih 2018). Whether or not these
feedbacks are being taken into account, the risks posed by a CCS project
are being judged uninsurable in some cases (Guthrie & Kirrane 2017),
reflecting again insurance’s constrained and two-sided relation with climate
change-related risks.
The most terrestrial of terrestrial carbon sequestration techniques is that
which positions soil as the key infrastructure. Rather than imagined as a
mere storage vessel, soil is imagined here as a world in miniature, including
busy factories of microbial, insect, plant, and fungi workers actively pulling
carbon in from the air and securing it in myriad forms (Krzywoszynska
2020). Adding to the attractiveness of soil carbon sequestration is the
fact that much of it is being pursued on farmland (e.g. Australia’s Carbon
Farming Initiative), enrolling the agricultural sector into climate change
action in a refreshingly positive way, and giving geoengineering agrarian
appeal (Kearnes & Rickards 2020). For farmers where ‘carbon farming’
schemes exist, carbon sequestration offers an income diversification option
and thus some ‘insurance’ to farm businesses against poor production profitability. More significantly, it offers co-benefits, notably improvements in
soil health and climate resilience, particularly when pursued as part of a
broader ‘regenerative’ agriculture approach (Kearnes & Rickards 2020). As
Turning to the terrestrial
Many of the geoengineering interventions mentioned above are up in the
air figuratively as well as physically. In contrast, terrestrial carbon sequestration is down to earth, if far from tried and true. ‘Technological’ versions of carbon removal, such as Carbon Capture and Storage, are often
terrestrial in the double sense of capturing CO 2 from the combustion of
once-subterranean fossil carbon (coal, oil, or gas) and related industrial
processes, then extracting, liquifying, transporting, and injecting the liquid back underground, often into empty oil and gas reservoirs. Initially
invented by the oil industry to extract remnant oil from reservoirs, CCS is
a highly energy- intensive process that, like all carbon removal methods,
relies on the assurance that it will never leak the CO 2 into the atmosphere.
It is not a confident promise. The entire value chain and production cycle
is replete with leakage risks (Guthrie & Kirrane 2017). For the insurance
industry, though, this opens up yet another risk frontier and market. As
Swiss Re (2020) beckons: ‘By 2050, billions of tons of CO 2 will need to be
stored: the front- runners among insurers will profit from the experience
gathered over the next decade.’ Insurance products for CCS are indeed
emerging.
At the same time, the possibility of catastrophic CO 2 loss (and related
human poisonings and impacts on the climate) threatens to limit the new
market. There is a non-negligible likelihood of mass CO 2 release caused by
seismic activity, especially given that such instability seems to be exacerbated by both climate change and the injection of liquids into geological
formations, as CCS does (Buis 2019; Masih 2018). Whether or not these
feedbacks are being taken into account, the risks posed by a CCS project
are being judged uninsurable in some cases (Guthrie & Kirrane 2017),
reflecting again insurance’s constrained and two-sided relation with climate
change-related risks.
The most terrestrial of terrestrial carbon sequestration techniques is that
which positions soil as the key infrastructure. Rather than imagined as a
mere storage vessel, soil is imagined here as a world in miniature, including
busy factories of microbial, insect, plant, and fungi workers actively pulling
carbon in from the air and securing it in myriad forms (Krzywoszynska
2020). Adding to the attractiveness of soil carbon sequestration is the
fact that much of it is being pursued on farmland (e.g. Australia’s Carbon
Farming Initiative), enrolling the agricultural sector into climate change
action in a refreshingly positive way, and giving geoengineering agrarian
appeal (Kearnes & Rickards 2020). For farmers where ‘carbon farming’
schemes exist, carbon sequestration offers an income diversification option
and thus some ‘insurance’ to farm businesses against poor production profitability. More significantly, it offers co-benefits, notably improvements in
soil health and climate resilience, particularly when pursued as part of a
broader ‘regenerative’ agriculture approach (Kearnes & Rickards 2020). As