Project developers and technical experts in CCS often cite the public as a “barrier” to CCS deployment, because decisions on whether individual projects move forward often significantly depend on the local community’s acceptance or opposition. Yet, as with the introduction of many new technologies, proposed CCS projects have been met with mixed reactions from the public, and in particular from the local communities asked to host them. Commercial-scale CCS demonstration projects are required to demonstrate whether or not the technology should play a major role in bridging today’s fossil fuel–driven world and tomorrow’s low- or zero-carbon economy. Leading industrial nations, through the G8, have called for 20 such demonstration plants to be launched by 2010, with a view toward broad deployment by 2020.Īctions taken to demonstrate transformational clean energy technology over the next decade will define the solutions available to help solve the climate problem. Several are currently being built in Europe, China, Australia, and Canada, and many more are in the planning stages, including in the United States. To address this gap, governments of many major economies have announced plans to support commercial-scale CCS demonstration projects that store more than 1 million metric tons of CO2 annually. However, the technology has not yet been demonstrated at the scale required for application to commercial power and industrial plants. The scale of the climate change challenge requires a portfolio of clean energy technologies and energy efficiency efforts, and most credible analyses project that CCS will have to play a substantial role in achieving the necessary emissions reductions (see Appendix 3).ĬCS has been tested at a small scale, and there are a few industrial operations around the world, including in North America and Europe, which already capture and store small quantities of CO2 emissions underground. Achieving cuts in energy-related CO2 emissions is critical to avoiding more than a 1.5 degree Celsius (☌) (2.7 degree Fahrenheit ) rise in global temperatures by 2050 and the irreversible and damaging impacts such a temperature rise would have on people and ecosystems.

Executive Summary CCS and Climate Change MitigationĬarbon dioxide capture and storage (CCS) encompasses a suite of existing and emerging technologies for capture, transport, and storage of carbon dioxide (CO2) that together can be used to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel power generation and other industrial sources. This report was designed to provide guidance to Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) project developers, regulators, and local communities as they engage in discussions regarding potential CCS projects.

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