CCUS

The permitting process for carbon-capture projects is, in some ways, like navigating Houston’s notorious rush-hour traffic — if everyone tries to move at once, gridlock can quickly ensue. That’s true at both the federal level, where the EPA has more sequestration wells under review than ever before, and at the state level, where Louisiana just hit the pause button on its reviews. In today’s RBN blog, we look at how increased interest in carbon capture has exacerbated the permitting backlog.

Passage of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in August 2022 was intended to unleash a wave of clean-energy initiatives, from hydrogen and renewable fuels to electric vehicles and large-scale carbon-capture projects, all part of the Biden administration’s plans to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and move the U.S. closer to a net-zero economy. But while billions in federal financing and tax credits have helped move many projects forward, they can only advance as fast as permitting, regulations and economic reality will allow. In today’s RBN blog, we look at the surge in proposed carbon-capture projects since passage of the IRA, where they are in the review process, and how the pace of permitting at the federal level compares with the states that have primacy over their own sequestration wells. 

If the world is going to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to net-zero levels by 2050, a lot of things need to go right, with the success of the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) long-term plan balancing on three different pillars. First, there are emissions reductions from improvements to fossil fuels and processes, such as power generation and industrial production. Next, there are advancements in bioenergy, a category that includes biofuels like ethanol, sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), and renewable diesel (RD). And then there’s direct air capture (DAC) — a minor factor so far, but one with the potential for significant growth, especially given the billions in U.S. funding already set aside for it. In today’s RBN blog, we look at U.S. plans to develop four regional DAC hubs, how those proposals will be evaluated, and the likely timeline for their development.

The 45Q tax credit has been the federal government’s main tool to incentivize the development of a carbon-capture industry. If the original legislation that created the credit in 2008 was intended to get things started, and the credit’s 2018 expansion designed to give the industry a further boost, the newly enacted Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) — which focuses on clean energy, despite its name — aims to propel carbon capture into the big time. In today’s RBN blog we look at changes made to the 45Q tax credit under the IRA, from the scope of the enhanced incentives to how they could boost carbon-capture opportunities for all types of projects.

As a piece of legislation makes its way through Congress, the name it’s given can say a lot about its overall importance and what it intends to accomplish, but also a little bit about the current political environment. Surging inflation has been one of the biggest stories of the past year and politicians of all stripes have been looking for ways to ease the pressure on consumers. Those concerns were a big reason why the Biden administration’s Build Back Better Act (BBBA), which included several climate- and energy-related measures, ultimately died in Congress late last year. The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which Democrats in Washington hope to pass soon, embraces the fight against inflation and includes other significant provisions, but clean energy is at the heart of the bill. In today’s RBN blog, we look at the legislation's climate and clean-energy initiatives — including a methane-reduction program, more tax credits for electric vehicles, and incentives for renewable energy and clean hydrogen — and how they would help reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

It’s one thing if you’re 25 or 30 years old and your 401(k) is just getting started — you’ve got time to build it up, so don’t sweat it — but it’s quite another if you’re 60 or 65 and you’ve still got to sock away a lot of money before calling it quits. It could be argued that the environmental community is facing a quandary very similar to that of an aging boomer short on retirement savings. The fact is that the International Energy Agency’s (IEA’s) target of achieving net-zero man-made carbon emissions globally by 2050 in order to blunt the human impact on climate change will require massive new investment and a complete and well-coordinated transformation of the world’s energy complex. In the near-term, progress along that path must include an extraordinarily rapid ramp-up in the use of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS). And like an aging worker whose late discipline may be thwarted by an unforeseen health challenge, as we’ve seen with the recent energy crisis, there’s a lot that could derail progress toward those goals. Is the IEA's goal achievable? Maybe. But, as we discuss in today’s RBN blog, it won’t be easy.

Carbon-capture projects have been slow to take root in the U.S., but that may be changing as a number of companies are now advancing plans to capture the carbon dioxide that results from ethanol production in the Midwest. Ethanol plants are an obvious choice, given that the CO2 resulting from ethanol fermentation is highly concentrated, which makes capturing it more efficient (and less expensive) compared to many other industrial processes. But while the relative ease and economy of capturing those emissions might seem like a no-brainer, convincing the public to go along with those plans has been more difficult. In today’s RBN blog, we look at what’s being planned.

Much like baling out a flooded basement with a spoon or shoveling the driveway in the middle of a snowstorm, carbon-capture projects to date have had minimal impact at best on the bigger goal of reducing global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and removing carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere. But an ExxonMobil-led project that’s taking shape in and around Houston could soon set a new mark for the scale at which carbon-capture projects operate. The plan calls for capturing, gathering, compressing and sequestering up to 50 million metric tons per annum (MMtpa) of CO2 by 2030, and up to twice that much by 2040 — enough to start making a real dent in Gulf Coast CO2 emissions. In today’s RBN blog, we take a closer look at the biggest carbon-capture project currently taking shape: ExxonMobil’s proposed Houston CCS Innovation Zone.

When U.S. lawmakers introduced the 45Q tax credit in 2008, they were planting a seed they hoped would one day sprout into a flourishing carbon-capture industry. As the years wore on and the number of successful projects remained small, they added a little fertilizer in 2018, not only enhancing the value of the credits but easing some of the limitations in the earlier legislation. It’s now 2022 and, with climate concerns and the energy transition at top of mind, Washington is again looking at ways to make the tax credit more effective and spur new growth in carbon-capture projects. In today’s RBN blog, we look at how economic and technological challenges have so far limited the success of carbon-capture initiatives.

Not so long ago, most folks in the energy industry hardly gave carbon dioxide (CO2) a thought. Sure, some CO2 was used for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) and in some production areas the natural gas coming out of the ground had to be treated to remove high levels of CO2. But otherwise, CO2 wasn’t on the industry’s radar. Now though, CO2 is a front-and-center concern not just for the energy industry but for society at large as the global economy tries to decarbonize. And while renewable energy like wind and solar will be part of that decades-long effort, so will the push to capture CO2 and permanently store it deep underground. Put simply, it’s time for producers, midstreamers, and refiners alike to gain a deeper understanding of carbon capture and sequestration, how it will affect them, and — ideally — how they can profit from it. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss highlights from our new Drill Down Report.