Farmers and ranchers around the world are experimenting with new techniques that pull carbon from the atmosphere and store it in soil. These regenerative agriculture practices can boost farmers’ bottom line by improving soil health and, if scaled up, could draw down gigatons of carbon dioxide annually. Meet the food companies and farmers who are working on the first regenerative products and learn about a sector that has the potential for dramatic growth.

We must deploy technologies that suck carbon from the air if we are to avoid catastrophic climate change. Doing so would create a huge new industry: one recent study estimated that products worth an estimated $5 trillion could be manufactured from CO2. This discussion will survey the ecosystem of opportunities in chemicals, materials and infrastructure that will emerge from the growth of this new sector.

According to Project Drawdown, regenerative agriculture has the potential to remove more than 20 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by 2050 — equivalent to suspending all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions for 3 years. But how do we know the carbon will stay in soils? And what's the best way to keep it there? Dive into the science behind the soil with filmmaker, faculty member and regenerative ag expert Peter Byck.

About Roundtable Lunches: Join interactive lunch discussions, moderated by an expert or thought leader, held at roundtables of up to 10 participants. These are freeform discussions, so bring your own challenges, questions, and ideas to talk through and get to know your fellow conference participants. All roundtable lunches do not have advanced sign-up – participation is first-come, first-served. 

A new generation of startups is commercializing technologies that transform waste greenhouse gases into fuels, chemicals, materials...even animal feed. This session will open with an overview of the startup landscape from carbon economy investors, followed by a chance to meet both the investors and entrepreneurs from startups working on some of the most significant new technologies.

Thanks to corporate investments, a slew of new forestry projects will help remove significant amounts of carbon from the atmosphere in the coming decade. For many innovative companies, making a direct investment in a forestry project can be one of the most effective ways of offsetting emissions. To help navigate these projects’ social, economic and scientific complexities, companies are partnering with top environmental organizations. In this session, key players behind from both sides of the partnerships will discuss how they are working together to protect and restore forests, including planting millions of trees.

Many companies have committed to reducing their greenhouse gas emissions. But could your company one day remove more carbon from the atmosphere than it emits? It seems a daunting challenge, but some companies have already committed to making it happen. Hear from the pioneering executives who are figuring out how to create climate positive companies.

With a new federal tax credit in place, carbon capture is taking off at power plants, ethanol facilities, steel mills and elsewhere. Exciting new uses for the captured carbon are emerging alongside these projects. This session focuses on the new technologies that make capture and utilization possible, the new credits that make it profitable and how leading players in this space are planning for the future.

Soap. Vodka. Jewelry. A handful of first-mover companies are creating consumer products using greenhouse gases captured from the atmosphere. This nascent market has the potential to impact hospitality, retail and multiple other sectors. In this session, the entrepreneurs behind some of the new carbon innovations will discuss the technologies involved, customer reaction to products made from recycled carbon, and the opportunities in this new class of consumer products.