Towards improved cost estimates for monitoring, reporting and verification of carbon dioxide removal

Alongside actions to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, carbon dioxide will need to be removed from the atmosphere if the world is to meet the Paris Agreement climate goals. The proliferation of net zero targets, and by extension the use of carbon dioxide removal (CDR), has led to increased attention on the governance of CDR. Monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) is a central component of the governance architecture. This report examines the cost of MRV for different CDR methods, the extent to which the cost of MRV for different methods is perceived as a barrier to their upscaling, where opportunities lie to reduce the cost of MRV and what factors influence the choice of MRV protocol. It provides recommendations for the UK government but which are more widely applicable.