The Northern Lights project — a joint venture between Equinor, Shell, and TotalEnergies captured CO₂ from industrial facilities across Europe will be liquefied, shipped by tanker to Norway's western coast, and injected 2,600 meters beneath the North Sea seabed into a saline aquifer capable of storing hundreds of millions of tonnes.

 

Norway is burying carbon under the North Sea — and building a business model around it.

Norway is one of Europe's largest oil and gas producers. It is also one of Europe's most aggressive investors in carbon capture and storage. That apparent contradiction is, in Norway's view, a responsibility.

The Northern Lights project — a joint venture between Equinor, Shell, and TotalEnergies — is building Europe's first open-access carbon capture and storage infrastructure. CO₂ captured from industrial facilities across Europe will be liquefied, shipped by tanker to Norway's western coast, and injected 2,600 meters beneath the North Sea seabed into a saline aquifer capable of storing hundreds of millions of tonnes.

The Sleipner field in the North Sea has already been storing CO₂ since 1996 — the world's first commercial CCS operation. Over 20 million tonnes have been stored there without incident. Sleipner proved the concept. Northern Lights will prove the business model.

Norway's government has committed over NOK 16 billion to the Longship CCS program — funding Northern Lights and supporting capture projects at cement and waste-to-energy plants. The Brevik cement plant in Telemark will become the world's first cement facility to capture its full CO₂ emissions at scale.

Cement production alone accounts for roughly 8% of global CO₂ emissions. If Norway's model proves that full capture is economically viable at a cement plant, it changes the calculus for one of the hardest industrial sectors to decarbonize.

Norway is not waiting for perfect conditions. It is building the infrastructure now.

Gassnova — Norwegian State Enterprise for CCS — 2024

#CarbonCapture #Norway #CCS #NorthernLights #Equinor #CleanTech #NetZero #NorthSea #IndustrialDecarbonization #ClimateAction— in New York, NY, United States.