Despite what it may look like on X, a majority of U.S. adults trust what scientists say about the environment.

That trust, however, may be shaky. According to research by the Political Psychology Research Group at Stanford University, the percentage of Americans who say they trust scientists on the environment has declined to 67% this year from 75% in 2020. In 2023, the Pew Research Center found that U.S. adults rated climate scientists¡¯ understanding of the causes and solutions lower than in 2021.

Decarbonizing the global economy is an enormous challenge and arguments against clean energy and electric vehicles have shown already how distrust can derail climate solutions ¡ª or at least hinder a speedy rollout. The issue of public trust is particularly salient as scientists seek to scale technologies designed to clean up the mess made by the burning of fossil fuels: excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

The sixth assessment report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concludes that: ¡°The deployment of carbon dioxide removal to counterbalance hard-to-abate residual emissions is unavoidable if net-zero CO2 or GHG emissions are to be achieved.¡± Yet some methods used to remove greenhouse gas from the atmosphere and to achieve permanent geological storage may seem troubling or even downright unbelievable to the general public.

Unfortunately, carbon dioxide removal is often lumped together with even more contentious ideas like solar radiation management under the umbrella term ¡°geoengineering.¡± Though both variants are interventions in the Earth¡¯s climate system, there are key differences in both the science and ethics. Solar-based methods such as cloud brightening or stratospheric aerosol scattering ¡ª attempts to reflect more of the sun¡¯s rays ¡ª are more like painkillers than cures, mitigating symptoms without addressing the cause. Utilizing carbon dioxide removal once emissions have been drastically reduced, however, is the only way we could feasibly reverse the damage we¡¯ve done.

Concerns about carbon dioxide removal mainly stem from questions about its cumulative effects on the environment and public health. Some fears are rooted in a gut feeling: Ocean alkalinity enhancement, for example, involves adding an alkaline substance to water in order to speed up the ocean¡¯s natural carbon cycle. Though ultimately it¡¯s accelerating a natural process by adding widely used materials like limestone or magnesium hydroxide, the method runs counter to the narrative that we shouldn¡¯t dump stuff into the ocean. No wonder folks are suspicious. Conversely, methods deemed closer to nature ¡ª such as planting trees ¡ª have greater public acceptance.

Other fears are based on past experience. Direct air capture (DAC) facilities use pipelines to transport the CO2 removed from ambient air to underground storage sites. But memories of the CO2 pipeline rupture in Satartia,...