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Captain Drawdown’s weekly Sunday selection — 48 candidate stories considered, 6-9 picked. Each link carries our 1-2 sentence take so you don’t have to click everything to know what’s there. The week’s most useful signal came from a five-year scorecard on whether durable CDR has lived up to its 2021 promises — and the answer, predictably, is “uneven.” Around it, mineralization quietly emerged as the pathway with the most institutional momentum (Frontier, Carbon Direct, Arca, a new Quebec hub), while buyer-side activity continued to broaden beyond DAC into biochar and enhanced rock weathering (ERW) portfolios. Meanwhile Europe is sending mixed signals on carbon markets: Germany retiring allowances, IEEFA pushing back on power-sector CCS, and the EU inching toward letting international removals back in. ...

The premise Biomass burial is the deliberate placement of plant matter — wood chips, agricultural residues, sludges, algae, even whole logs — into an environment where it cannot decompose. The carbon a tree pulled from the air over its lifetime stays as carbon, instead of returning to the atmosphere as CO₂ or methane within years or decades. The appeal is that the hard part of carbon removal — pulling CO₂ out of dilute air — has already been done, for free, by photosynthesis. The engineering problem is narrower: stop the rot. ...

The day CDR’s biggest buyer blinked Microsoft paused new carbon removal purchases today, and the rest of the day’s news has to be read through that lens. One company has driven the bulk of durable CDR demand for three years. When that company stops buying, even briefly, the market learns how thin its foundations really are. The pause is reportedly tied to a portfolio review and tighter scrutiny on delivery risk and verification quality. Microsoft has not walked away. But suppliers who built business plans around the assumption of steady offtake from Redmond are now reworking their models. Several developers I spoke to expect a slower second half of 2026 for new contracts across direct air capture, biochar, and enhanced rock weathering. ...

Carbon Herald just published New Deal Advances CO2 Storage Plans For England And South Wales. Carbon Herald reports that a new deal has been signed to develop a carbon capture and storage hub at Avonmouth Docks, advancing infrastructure plans aimed at industrial emitters across England and South Wales. The agreement is presented as a step toward building out CO2 handling and transport capacity in the region, connecting capture sites with storage routes. The piece frames the project within broader UK efforts to scale CCS as part of decarbonisation strategies for hard-to-abate sectors. Specific operators and project partners are named in the original article, along with the role Avonmouth could play as a regional collection point. ...

Carbon Herald just published Deep Sky Enters DAC-Focused Strategic Partnership With ENGIE. Carbon Herald reports that Canadian carbon removal developer Deep Sky has entered a strategic partnership with multinational energy company ENGIE, centered on direct air capture (DAC) projects. The collaboration brings together Deep Sky’s role as a project developer and aggregator of DAC technologies with ENGIE’s experience in large-scale energy infrastructure. The article frames the deal as part of Deep Sky’s broader push to scale carbon removal capacity and connect captured CO2 to permanent storage. Additional context in the piece points to related CO2 storage planning activity in England and South Wales tied to the partners’ broader ambitions. ...

Carbon Herald just published Iowa Landowners Protest Use Of Eminent Domain For Carbon Pipelines. Carbon Herald reports that landowners in Iowa gathered outside the State Capitol on Tuesday to protest the use of eminent domain for carbon dioxide pipeline projects. The demonstration reflects ongoing tension between pipeline developers seeking to route CO2 infrastructure through agricultural land and property owners who object to compulsory easements. Eminent domain has become a flashpoint in the Midwest as multiple CCS-linked pipeline proposals advance through state regulatory processes. Iowa has been a focal point because of its concentration of ethanol facilities, which are among the prospective CO2 sources feeding planned pipeline networks. The protest follows a series of hearings and legal challenges over whether private CO2 pipelines qualify for eminent domain authority under Iowa law. ...

This chart plots every pure-play CDR company in the Directory as a single dot. The horizontal axis is the company’s founding year (estimated from its primary domain registration), the vertical axis is its current headcount on a log scale, and the colour codes the company’s pathway. The shaded blue background traces overall company density — darker patches mark where the crowd of pure-plays sits. The value here is shape, not ranking. A bar chart would tell you how many companies exist in each pathway; this view tells you the entire industry’s growth contour at one glance — when did the wave of small startups hit, where are the rare big older operators, what cluster sits on the floor of “still under five people”. Outlier dots near the top of the chart are the names everyone already knows; the dense low band is where most of the industry actually lives. ...

Mining waste, market concentration, and the feedstock question Today’s stories cluster around one uncomfortable truth: the CDR market is still defined by who buys, not what works. Microsoft’s pause has revealed that a single buyer drove roughly 80% of durable demand. Meanwhile, the supply side keeps innovating on feedstocks and certification, building infrastructure for a market that does not yet have enough customers. This is the gap CDR has to close in 2026. Technology readiness is running ahead of demand depth. ...

Carbon Herald just published Verde And Isometric To Commercialize A New Category Of Carbon Credits. Carbon Herald reports that Verde Resources has signed a strategic partnership with Isometric to commercialize what the companies describe as a new category of carbon credits. Isometric operates as a carbon removal registry focused on scientific rigor in measurement and verification, while Verde Resources develops nature-based and engineered removal projects. The collaboration is positioned as a step toward expanding the menu of credit types available to corporate buyers, though the article frames the announcement around the partners’ intent to standardize methodology and issuance for the new category. Specific issuance volumes, pricing, and buyer commitments are not detailed in the recap. ...

Heatmap News just published Carbon Removal After Microsoft. Heatmap News reports that Microsoft, by far the largest buyer of carbon removal credits, has informed suppliers it is pausing new purchases. The company bought more than 70 million tons of CDR credits in recent years, including 45 million tons last year alone, dwarfing the next largest buyer Frontier at 1.8 million tons total since 2022. Microsoft says the pause is not permanent and that its 2030 carbon negative goal remains in place, framing the change as a pacing adjustment. Industry analysts quoted in the piece say many CDR startups built business models that effectively assumed Microsoft would be the backstop buyer, and a pullback removes roughly 80% of annual demand. ...