A carbon offset is any activity that compensates for the emission of CO₂ by providing for an emission reduction, or avoidance elsewhere. The reduction does not need to take place at the same moment in time as the emission. For example, an offset can be achieved by planting a tree, or preventing deforestation. The first action will only lead to CO₂ being removed from the atmosphere at a later point in time while the later does not increase the removal capacity (it prevents it from reducing). 

Carbon removal is the action of physically removing a defined amount of  CO₂ from the atmosphere therefore netting on exactly an identical emission elsewhere. 

If not for concerns over the climate, the real estate should care as there is a substantial likelihood that Carbon Removal will become mandatory in the near to mid term as the climate science increasingly demonstrates that the 1.5° C and 2° C target will not be achieved without carbon removal.

The current Carbon Removal technology is at its infancy  (for more about carbon removal technologies please see the Carbon Dioxyde Removal Primer). The main constraints that the real estate industry will face is the dispersion of its emissions. Unlike other heavy CO2 emitters, the emission points of the real estate industry are scattered. As such it will be hard to efficiently implement CDR at the point of emission.

The real estate industry will need to identify a viable CDR technology that would allow to remove a vast amount of dispersed emission of CO₂ in an efficient way. None of the existing Direct Air Capture (DAC) or Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) processed would be applicable efficiently to real estate emission.

The most promising field of research that could be used by real estate is related to CO2 mineralization. One of theses processes takes place in the concrete of our assets (so called carbonation process) . Similar processes can take place in other minerals, and provide for extensive fields of research for CO2 removal technology.