carbon capture

noun

plural carbon captures

1

: any of various methods of removing carbon dioxide (as from industrial emissions) to reduce its presence in the atmosphere

Carbon capture can be applied to large-scale emissions processes, including coal and gas-fired power generation …

—Global CCS Institute

Direct ocean carbon capture operations look a bit like desalination or wastewater treatment plants, though something quite different is going on inside their systems of filters, tubes, pumps and tanks.

—Brooke Staggs

Aramco has developed an innovative mobile carbon capture system that sharply reduces CO₂ emissions from a heavy-duty truck.

—Oil and Gas Climate Initiative

also : such a method combined with storing the carbon dioxide to keep it from entering the atmosphere : carbon capture and storage

Those bent on bringing down the fossil-fuel industry are also less than thrilled with the … push for technologies such as carbon capture, which removes and stores carbon emissions …

—Valerie Richardson

2

: the removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by living vegetation : carbon sequestration

Plants perform carbon capture every day through photosynthesis, and they actually do so quite well.

—Patrick Biller

Trees are nature's best carbon capture technology and have been working to clean the air since the first leafy frond appeared on Earth …

—Georgette Kilgore

Examples of carbon capture in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Teams will eventually undertake soil studies and drone-based, multispectral ground sensing to measure potential improvements to soil quality and carbon capture capacity on farmland that uses these techniques. —Robin Roenker, USA Today, 18 Apr. 2025

That office received roughly $27 billion in funding from the Inflation Reduction Act, as well as bipartisan infrastructure law, to finance carbon capture, hydrogen and advanced nuclear projects. —Bloomberg News, Boston Herald, 16 Feb. 2025

For utilities and gas power generation companies, embracing innovations like hydrogen together with the technology of carbon capture and storage (CCUS) presents an opportunity to further reduce emissions. —Javier Cavada, Forbes.com, 23 Apr. 2025

Particularly, blue hydrogen (made with carbon capture) is scaling up on the Gulf Coast, then also Texas and Oklahoma have great potential for green hydrogen that can also piggyback and plug into the infrastructure. —Alan Ohnsman, Forbes, 24 Mar. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1971, in the meaning defined at sense 2

Rhymes for carbon capture

• rapture
• recapture