The above summarizes our studies and conclusions so far, and thus reasons for our focus and work. Naturally, others may reach different denouements, which may be equally or even more valid. (Indeed, we can give no guarantees that our approach will ultimately even work.) Therefore, we made our reviews also available in detail, hoping that this may help others on their path. If this can enable economic, large-scale carbon capture even by a small bit, that would be delightful.

Below are the links to our more detailed reviews and data: ¹

1. Deep Carbon, Surface Carbon – Earth’s carbon stores and it’s two carbon cycles

When working with any difficult issue, it is important to understand the problem’s broader context. In particular, when considering atmospheric carbon, it is important to understand Earth’s two carbon cycles and Earth’s carbon stores. In the common discourse it is easy to loose sight of the scales involved and mis-judge.

2. Carbon Emissions – Timelapse maps of worldwide CO₂ emissions 1959-present

Similarly, when trying to address the challenges, it is important to understand the problem’s fundamental causes and underlying economics. There is naturally already a lot of data on carbon emissions, and repeating them is not useful. The one new method we found to be insightful was to first review the economics of energy generation, and then compare them to the time lapse maps of carbon emissions from 1959 to present. They are a good way to comprehend the underlying causes – and suggest that attempting to curb CO₂ emissions alone is not going to be enough, even close.

3. Atmospheric Carbon – Carbon Capture from first principles

When looking at solutions in turn, it is important to understand the problem from its first principles. In the case of atmospheric carbon these turn out to be it’s three main physical characteristics: Volume, Sparseness, and Mass. These heavily determine which solutions are likely to work and which are not.

4. Biome Carbon – Carbon in biomes and Why forests are the key
5. Forests’ Carbon – Comparing Tropical / Temperate / Boreal forests

As the atmospheric CO₂‘s physical constraints dictate the effectiveness of various opportunities, it is likely that large-scale absorption can occur mainly in oceans, land surfaces, and forests. By studying each of the biomes in detail, it is readily apparent why forests that are the key. We analysed each of these biomes using their physical characteristics and from program perspective using Aurora Forealis’ Seven S’s criteria. ² Same methodology was used in the choice of which forest biome to ultimately concentrate on.

6. Boreal Carbon – Opportunities in biome wide silviculture

The above analysis lead to our current focus on boreal forests. Naturally, ideas and concepts are probably less that 1% of any real solution – implementation and concrete work are the 99%. The section on Boreal Forest Carbon explains the current programs and work undertaken at the Aurora Forealis foundation.

1. These can also be accessed through the site’s menu. ↩︎
2. At Aurora Forealis, we have developed an internal framework Seven S’s to analyse programs and opportunities. The framework is naturally not limited to forests nor atmospheric carbon, and can be used in any foundation’s analysis. For a more detailed outline of it see
   Seven S’s – methodology for analysing programs and opportunities
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