Google Opens 2026 Carbon Removal Research Funding Focused on Scale, Certainty and Climate-Impact Measurement

Google has opened applications for its 2026 research funding programme for carbon removal and super-pollutant reduction, with an emphasis on advancing fundamental science and deployable technologies.

The programme covers research areas including ocean alkalinity enhancement, bioenergy with carbon capture, dilute methane oxidation, wetland restoration, perennial crops, and monitoring and quantification.

Funding levels vary by research topic, with individual projects eligible to apply for up to USD 500,000.

Eligible applicants include universities, research institutions, nonprofit organisations, social enterprises and companies with comparable research capacity.

Google is concentrating the research objectives on certainty of climate benefit, the scale of reduction or removal, and monitoring, reporting and verification capacity.

Applications opened on 11 August and close on 25 September, with selected projects expected to receive funding before the end of the year.

The institutional value of this type of funding lies not only in technical breakthroughs but also in establishing data, methods and research results that can be publicly examined.

Issues to watch include the fields selected, the openness of resulting work and whether the research can narrow the gap between experimental evidence and deployment at scale.