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Carbon-Capture Investment Panel

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Grades 6-860-90 minSource: Creative Dad Company

Students act as an investment panel that judges real carbon-capture technologies. They look closely at the evidence behind each company's claims about size, energy use, and real effect on the climate. It is numbers-first climate learning.

Budget levels

Amazon prices checked Oct 9-10, 2026 and may change

Materials links go to Amazon. Prices are estimates and may change. As an Amazon Associate, Creative Dad Company earns from qualifying purchases.

Quick Start

Digital downloads only.

$0 to buy. Printing noted separately.

Student time: one class period, one day.

Teacher prep / build-ahead: separate from student time.

Scale it

The default plan is one class period on a single day.

Scale back: Fit it into a shorter period, use fewer effects, or run a demo instead of a build.

Scale up: Add one extra effect, or spread the share-out across another day.

Ambiance video

Ambiance video coming soon from Creative Dad Studio

  • Printed CO2, temperature, solar output, global fossil fuel emissions since 1900, and volcanic eruption timeline graphsPrintinguse what you have

Full Experience

Required materials for the class.

$0 per class (class of about 30, 6 groups).

Student time: one day.

Teacher prep / build-ahead: separate from student time.

Scale it

The default plan is one school day.

Scale back: Fit the build into one period with fewer effects.

Scale up: Spread the work across days, or add more effects.

Total Transformation

The bigger kit, with every optional item included.

$0 per class (class of about 30, 6 groups).

Student time: one day (one session, one-day event).

Teacher prep / build-ahead: separate from student time.

Scale it

The default plan is one session, a one-day event.

Scale back: Shorten the event, or run a demo for a smaller audience.

Scale up: Spread the build and the event across days, or invite a bigger audience.

Materials

Real-world brief about a carbon-capture technology (teacher-prepared; not in the pack); Calculator; Printed CO2; temperature; solar output; global fossil fuel emissions since 1900; and volcanic eruption timeline graphs

Materials links go to Amazon. Prices are estimates and may change.

As an Amazon Associate, Creative Dad Company earns from qualifying purchases.

Steps

  1. Look at graphs of atmospheric CO2 (Mauna Loa), global average temperature over the past century, solar output, global fossil fuel CO2 emissions since 1900, and a timeline of major volcanic eruptions. Write at least six questions to clarify the evidence, including at least two linking human activities to the CO2 rise (for example 'Did CO2 rise as fossil fuel burning rose?' or 'How much CO2 comes from cement and farming?'), at least one ruling volcanoes in or out (for example 'Did large eruptions warm or cool the planet afterward?'), and at least one about the sun (for example 'Did temperature rise while solar output stayed flat?').
  2. Use short provided readings and the graphs to answer each question with numbers from the graphs, and sort the factors into human (fossil fuel burning, cement, agriculture, land clearing) and natural (sun, volcanoes). Record which factors the evidence supports as main causes of the temperature rise and which it rules out.
  3. Read briefs about two or three carbon-capture technologies (such as direct air capture, tree planting, and capture at a power plant). Predict whether each claimed size is realistic.
  4. Calculate how much carbon each captures per unit of energy used and per dollar.
  5. Compare your numbers to each company's claim, find the gaps, and ask questions about which assumptions explain them.
  6. As a panel, write the criteria and constraints with numbers before scoring: captures at least 10 percent of the town's yearly emissions, costs under 200 dollars per ton, uses less energy per ton than the fossil fuel it would take to supply that energy, and fits the available land on the town map.
  7. Score each technology in a decision matrix against every criterion and constraint, using your calculations.
  8. Vote as a panel on which to invest in, presenting the warming evidence board (human and natural factors) and the matrix behind your decision.

Standards mapped

  • NGSS · MS-ESS3-5

    Ask questions to clarify evidence of the factors that have caused the rise in global temperatures over the past century.

  • NGSS · MS-ETS1-2

    Evaluate competing design solutions using a systematic process to determine how well they meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.