Introducing the Carbon Curve Podcast + Jason Hochman on a New Coalition to Scale Up Direct Air Capture

Introducing The Carbon Curve Podcast with Na’im Merchant

Na’im is an advisor and thought partner to start-ups, policy groups, and research organizations on scaling up the climate technologies to meet the monumental challenge removing billions of tons of CO2 from the atmosphere. According to the IPCC, large scale carbon dioxide removal is “essential” to meeting our climate goals - but few people know about carbon removal, how critical a tool it is in combating climate change, or the ways they can have an impact on this field.

Na’im launched The Carbon Curve newsletter in 2021 to start chipping away at this problem. Now he’s launching this podcast to profile the work of inspiring entrepreneurs, activists, scientists, and policy experts pushing the boundaries on what’s possible on carbon removal - with the aim of inspiring more people to get involved in the space.

Every two weeks, Na’im will release a short interview with one of these impressive individuals advancing bold new ideas and taking a collective action approach to scaling up carbon removal.

Jason Hochman and the Direct Air Capture Coalition

Our first episode is with Jason Hochman (Twitter, LinkedIn), Co-Founder and Senior Director of the Direct Air Capture Coalition. The DAC Coalition brings together technology companies and partners to advance deployment of DAC, with over 25 members, and 10 partners and observers to date. As the carbon removal field grows, coalitions like this will be necessary to create the ecosystem for new DAC technologies to flourish. In this episode, Na’im and Jason talk about:

* The origins and mission of the DAC Coalition

* DAC Coalition’s membership

* The DOE’s $3.5 billion DAC Hubs Initiative

* Is DAC getting too much funding/attention?

* Reframing carbon removal from being a burden to an inclusive, global opportunity

If you like this episode, please subscribe to this podcast on your favorite podcast app or subscribe via The Carbon Curve newsletter here. If you’d like to get in touch with Na’im, you can reach out via Twitter and LinkedIn.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit carboncurve.substack.com