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Microsoft’s million-tonne CO2-removal purchase — lessons for net zero

Strengthen markets, measures and definitions for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to fight climate change.
  1. Lucas Joppa

    1. Lucas Joppa is chief environmental officer at Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, Washington, USA.

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  2. Amy Luers

    1. Amy Luers is global lead of sustainability science at Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, Washington, USA.

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  3. Elizabeth Willmott

    1. Elizabeth Willmott is director of the Carbon Program at Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, Washington, USA.

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  4. S. Julio Friedmann

    1. S. Julio Friedmann is senior scientific adviser at Carbon Direct, New York City; and a senior research scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy, Columbia University, New York City, New York, USA.

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  5. Steven P. Hamburg

    1. Steven P. Hamburg is chief scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund, New York City, New York, USA.

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  6. Rafael Broze

    1. Rafael Broze is manager of the Carbon Removal Program at Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, Washington, USA.

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In January this year, Microsoft made a major announcement: it had paid for the removal of 1.3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Among its purchases were projects to expand forests in Peru, Nicaragua and the United States, as well as initiatives to regenerate soil across US farms. Microsoft will pay the Swiss firm Climeworks to operate a machine in Iceland that pulls CO2 from the air and injects it into the ground, where it mineralizes and turns to stone. The amount of CO2 to be removed is equivalent to about 11% of the annual emissions from Microsoft’s value chain; of this, the company will count less than half as being certified to officially compensate for its emissions. It is the largest corporate procurement of carbon removal so far.

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Nature 597, 629-632 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-02606-3

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Competing Interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

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