Carbon sinks: What role should research play in accelerating their development in France? Position paper, October 2022

In order to remove CO₂ from the atmosphere, carbon sinks are a solution that is currently being considered as a unavoidable. Increasing but also preserving carbon sinks and, in some cases, restoring them, are priority issues. Based on a study by a group of experts from the ANCRE alliance, six major categories of carbon sinks have been identified for the French context: three categories of natural CO₂ capture solutions in more or less anthropized environments, and three categories of solutions integrating technological developments. The state of play, challenges, barriers and research recommendations for each of the solutions were highlighted in 7 worksheets: 1 - Carbon storage in biomass and agricultural and forest soils; 2 - Carbon storage in biomass and soils in urban and anthropised environments; 3 - Carbon storage in aquatic environments and from rock weathering; 4 - Technological solutions for capturing atmospheric CO₂ for geological storage; 5 - Storage of CO₂ in materials via mineralisation; 5bis - Biogenic CO₂ capture and storage in bio-based materials; 6 - Technological solutions for recycled carbon capture, utilisation, and long-term storage