WEBVTT

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- [Narrator] Around the world,
scientists and entrepreneurs

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are finding promising new
ways to remove carbon dioxide

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from the atmosphere and ocean

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in order to curb the
effects of climate change.

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Why?

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- To avoid the worst
effects of climate change,

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it won't be enough to
just reduce emissions.

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We'll also need to permanently
remove huge amounts of CO2

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already in the atmosphere and oceans.

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Five to 10 billion tons per year by 2050.

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While we have some ways to remove carbon,

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such as reforestation and
soil carbon sequestration,

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these solutions are unlikely to scale

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to the size of the problem.

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We need a gigaton scale portfolio

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of permanent carbon removal solutions.

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- [Narrator] Luckily, new
approaches, like kelp forests,

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bio oil injection and
direct to air capture

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are just a few of the
exciting innovations under way.

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But so far they've all
faced the same problem:

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they have no customers.

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New technologies like
solar panels, hard drives

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and DNA sequencing tend to
be expensive at the start,

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but costs come down
over time as they scale.

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Carbon removal is at the
beginning of a similar trajectory,

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and because it's expensive today,

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most companies would rather
buy low-cost alternatives.

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The problem is, without customers,

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these technologies can't
scale to reduce their costs.

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Not only that, but investors
don't want to invest

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in companies if it's unclear
that anybody will buy

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what they're selling.

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So without customers and investment,

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the carbon removal ecosystem
has been a bit stuck.

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Frontier is a new
initiative planning to spend

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a billion dollars buying carbon removal

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over the next nine years.

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It's a simple idea.

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By guaranteeing future demand
for these technologies now,

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we hope to help them scale
up and get cheaper, faster.

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- There's actually lots of capital.

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There's lots of excitement
and interest in climate.

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There's lots of people
who wanna work on it.

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But there's not a lot of buyers out there

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who are actually willing to
put down the money to say,

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OK, go put the carbon underground.

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- [Narrator] We've seen this cycle before.

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- In the mid-2000s, poorer
countries lacked access

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to the pneumococcal vaccine.

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Pharma companies weren't
motivated to spend the resources

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developing the vaccine
because they were unsure

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there'd be enough demand
to recoup their costs.

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In 2009, governments and
philanthropists pledged

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to spend $1.5 billion to
subsidise the purchase

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of the pneumococcal vaccine

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if the pharmaceutical
companies could produce it

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at a low enough cost.

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Hundreds of millions of
vaccine doses were purchased

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and distributed throughout the world,

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accelerating the vaccine
rollout by five years,

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and saving an estimated 700,000 lives.

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- [Narrator] This model,
guaranteeing demand

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to accelerate the
development of a new product,

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is called an Advance Market
Commitment, or an AMC.

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The idea is to send a signal
to researchers, entrepreneurs

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and investors that there
will be a big market

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for their technologies.

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In other words, start building.

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AMCs worked for vaccines,
and we think they can work

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for carbon removal too.

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Here's how Frontier works.

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Buyers decide how much they
want to spend on carbon removal

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and pool their commitments
through Frontier.

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Frontier's team of technical
and commercial experts find

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and vet suppliers to identify

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the most promising technologies,

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and then facilitate purchases
between buyers and suppliers,

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either upfront or through
offtake agreements.

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- Once we have a guaranteed
buyer, then we can secure

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the financing to build our next
plant, we can grow our team

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and attract the investment
that we need to scale.

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- [Narrator] Finally, as
carbon removal is delivered,

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suppliers are paid and
tons of carbon removal

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are passed back to buyers.

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Over the next nine years,

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Frontier's members will
spend nearly $1 billion

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buying permanent carbon removal.

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On the one hand, it's a lot of money,

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around 30 times what's been spent to date.

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On the other hand, it's less than 1%

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of what we need to spend
every year by 2050.

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So there's a long way to go.

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And our hope is that more
buyers will join Frontier

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in the months and years ahead.

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But our message to the
carbon removal world today

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is loud and clear:

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Build and we will buy.