You're listening to TED Talks Daily. I'm your host, Elise Hugh. You hear it a lot. We have to transition fast to renewable energy sources and away from fossil fuels in order to actually curb climate change. But what about all the current and near future carbon emissions and the towns that rely on oil and gas infrastructure.

In today's talk from TED at BCG 2020, we'll learn of an idea to trap CO2 that's endangering

the earth and still keep oil and gas-reliant towns alive. Carbon capture advisor Boss Sudmeyer

discusses this innovative waste disposal network for CO2.

If you're in charge of a major metropolitan city, it's almost a must these days to be sustainable.

Our city dwellers pride ourselves on living in places that are taking action on climate change

and achieving net zero. But what have you, Don Iverson? You're the mayor of Oil and Gas Town,

Edmonton, in Northern Alberta, Canada. Or across the Atlantic, Holly Mambycroft,

UK member of Parliament for Scunforb, home to one of the last steel plants in Britain.

Or much smaller, you're Dave Smigleski and you're the mayor of the little city of Granite Falls

in Minnesota, with a large-scale ethanol production facility nearby.

All these places, no matter how far apart and how different in size have something big in common,

millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions linked to significant local employment.

And we're going to have to find a way to maintain the critical economic and social functions of these towns

if we have any hope of combating climate change.

Not an easy feat if you think that we can't really put a solar panel on a gas processing facility

or a steel mill. Fortunately, these places have another interesting thing in common,

which might offer some hope to these local officials.

The main sources of pollution in their areas are in close proximity to rock formations with the ability to trap carbon dioxide, the greenhouse gas we often call CO2.

And this puts into reach a potential solution to both

their problems, pollution and employment. It's called carbon capture and storage. It's the process

whereby we capture the CO2, which results from burning fossil fuels before it's emitted into the

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