Carbon Sequestration

December 19, 2024

Why climate-skeptical Republicans may protect billions in taxpayer funding for a climate program

Funded by billions of dollars in new taxpayer subsidies approved by the Biden Administration, more than 160 projects have been proposed across the U.S. to capture carbon dioxide pollution from industry and bury it underground as a strategy to address climate change. But Donald Trump, who has called climate change a hoax, is returning to the White House, and climate-skeptical Republicans are taking control of Congress. The politics within the Republican Party and the economic interests of the oil and gas industry make Congress unlikely to eliminate subsidies for carbon capture. More than 90 percent of taxpayer-supported carbon capture projects in recent years have been run by fossil fuel companies.

Courtney Bernhardt

October 24, 2024

Chronic failures in Texas’ management of oil & gas wells raise alarms about the state’s request to run carbon capture

With billions of dollars in incentives on the line, companies across the U.S. are planning wells intended to permanently dispose of carbon dioxide, or CO₂. In most states, the Environmental Protection Agency is responsible for permitting these wells. However, the EPA has handed over that authority to three states -- North Dakota, Wyoming, and Louisiana. Texas now wants to join that list. Critics question whether the state's oil and gas regulator is fit for the job and competent enough to handle a major expansion of its authority into a new area of growth.

Preet Bains

October 17, 2024

Leaks at Illinois carbon injection project cast a shadow on the future of taxpayer-subsidized carbon capture

An ethanol plant in central Illinois has stopped injecting carbon dioxide (CO2) into the ground after a potential leak was discovered on the property for the second time this year. The problems at the Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) plant raise questions about the safety of about 150 other carbon capture wells proposed across the U.S., most with taxpayer funding.

Brendan Gibbons

August 1, 2024

Environmental Integrity Project launches updated Oil & Gas Watch database and news site

The Oil & Gas Watch database and news site are being re-launched today (Aug. 1) with new features to make it easier for users to track oil and gas developments in local areas and gather national data on the growing industry. The database features a new “alerts” function to highlight new projects, updates, and public hearings. It also has new search tools; the projected greenhouse gas and related health impacts of projects; new maps; and sharable summary pages for industries. We also redesigned the Oil & Gas Watch News site and email newsletter. We are hosting a free virtual webinar at 1 p.m. Eastern time on Aug. 21 to explain how to use the new database.

Preet Bains

July 18, 2024

Data shows Denbury’s carbon pipelines leak more than any other CO₂ pipeline company’s

Denbury is one of the largest companies producing oil though enhanced oil recovery, which uses CO₂ to dislodge oil remnants from nearly depleted stores. The company owns an extensive network of CO₂ pipelines to supply its oil fields. However, data from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) shows Denbury is responsible for more CO₂ leakage than any other CO₂ pipeline company. Since 2010, there have been 76 incidents involving CO₂ pipelines reported to PHMSA, collectively releasing nearly 67,000 barrels of CO₂ into the air...

Brendan Gibbons

May 15, 2024

Despite incentives for carbon capture, U.S. is still mining CO₂ to produce more oil

Even as the Biden Administration is providing billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies to encourage industry to capture carbon dioxide and bury it underground to help protect the climate, some companies are working in the opposite direction. In places like southwestern Colorado and Jackson, Mississippi, companies are pulling huge volumes of virgin CO₂ out of the ground to use it to extract more oil, which is then burned to contribute more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

Brendan Gibbons

April 25, 2024

In Illinois, a massive taxpayer-funded carbon capture project fails to capture about 90 percent of plant’s emissions

The project, run by ethanol producer Archer Daniels Midland and partners, received $281 million in taxpayer dollars via Department of Energy grants. It has stored more than 2.8 million metric tons of CO2 since 2011. However, EPA records show that represents a capture rate of only about 10-12 percent of the plant’s emissions each year at most, allowing the rest of the carbon dioxide to escape into the atmosphere. This small percentage raises questions about whether industrial-scale carbon capture technology can be a meaningful solution to global warming.

Brendan Gibbons

March 27, 2024

Thousands of abandoned wells in Louisiana threaten to leak carbon dioxide from storage projects

Louisiana is one of the hotspots in the U.S. for sequestration projects that trap carbon dioxide (CO2) underground to protect the climate. Companies are planning 58 storage wells at 24 sites across the state. However, experts say a century of oil and gas drilling has left thousands of pathways for CO2 to squeeze its way back out into the atmosphere, potentially eroding any climate benefits and creating a safety threat for nearby residents in the event of a massive rupture or leak. Two recent reports examine the threat from the more than 186,000 abandoned oil and gas wells in Louisiana.

Preet Bains

December 19, 2023

Report shows oil and gas companies are rushing to establish taxpayer-subsidized carbon storage projects with little monitoring

A new report by the Environmental Integrity Project shows that federal authorities fail to independently verify that “captured” carbon actually stays underground after companies receive their taxpayer subsidies. The analysis of 21 carbon capture monitoring, reporting, and verification plans approved so far by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency shows that the agency allows fossil fuel companies to write their own rules and plans, does not require specific monitoring strategies or technologies, and requires no third-party verification of data self-reported by companies.

Brendan Gibbons

December 7, 2023

Biden Administration proposes to allow disposal of carbon waste beneath national forests

The Biden Administration’s U.S. Forest Service recently proposed a regulatory change related to carbon capture and sequestration, a technology meant to remove or keep carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. Critics of the proposal say that the Forest Service would be granting fossil fuel and carbon disposal companies access to public property for decades, possibly forever, in support of a technology that has not been proven on a large scale and which some call a false solution.

Ari Phillips

October 25, 2023

Major carbon pipeline is cancelled as opposition grows and regulations remain elusive

Carbon dioxide accumulation is a big problem in the atmosphere. But increasingly, pipelines carrying CO2 underground are also raising objections, including from state governments, creating a roadblock to a major Biden Administration climate strategy. South Dakota and North Dakota recently denied permits for carbon pipelines, triggering the cancellation last week of a 1,300-mile carbon pipeline across five Midwestern states. Meanwhile, a dozen Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to President Biden demanding a moratorium on all new carbon pipelines until federal safety regulations are updated.

Brendan Gibbons

October 12, 2023

Oil & gas companies and investors placing big bets on federally-subsidized carbon capture projects

The world’s largest energy financiers – including oil and gas majors like ExxonMobil and Chevron – are investing billions of dollars in technology intended to capture carbon dioxide. Many supporters of carbon capture and storage see the technology as a path to lessen the climate impact of major industries and to offset the carbon dioxide emissions from major companies whose shareholders are pushing them towards carbon neutrality. But it remains unclear how many of these projects will become a reality or work.

Ari Phillips

September 27, 2023

Chinese ammonia plant in Louisiana could receive U.S. taxpayer subsidies

Louisiana's Ascension Parish, located along the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, is becoming a focal point of the fast-growing, federally-subsidized carbon capture industry. One proposed plant that would manufacture ammonia from natural gas and inject its waste underground is being developed by a partnership majority owned by the Chinese government.

Tom Pelton

July 18, 2023

Temperatures rise over whether EPA should allow Louisiana to permit carbon waste burial projects

This summer, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is expected to rule on a petition by Louisiana for state authority to issue permits for carbon dioxide waste disposal wells that would allow petrochemical companies to capture the climate-warming pollutant from their smokestacks and bury it underground. Encouraged by billions of dollars in public subsidies offered by the Biden Administration, oil and gas companies and other industries are proposing at least 27 carbon capture and sequestration projects in Louisiana, including beneath the Gulf of Mexico.

Tom Pelton

June 21, 2023

Federally-funded carbon waste disposal projects ignite opposition

More than 100 carbon capture and storage projects are proposed across the U.S., including 27 in Louisiana, because of billion of dollars in new federal tax credits. Many of these pollution burial projects are drawing opposition from local residents and scientists. One is in the fragile wetlands of southern Louisiana, where a Dallas-based company called Cox Oil received federal funding to help build a 110-mile carbon dioxide pipeline from petrochemical plants in Geismar, Louisiana, into the Gulf of Mexico near Grand Isle.

Ari Phillips

January 24, 2023

Direct air carbon capture sets up shop in the oilfields of Texas

A subsidiary of Occidental Petroleum – one of the largest oil producers in the country – is taking advantage of billions of federal decarbonization dollars up for grabs under new government subsidy programs to invest in climate tech solutions to global warming. Meanwhile, Occidental will still be pumping out oil and gas responsible for heating the atmosphere. It is simultaneously profiting from both fossil fuel extraction and carbon capture.

Tom Pelton

August 31, 2022

Investigation: Carbon capture tax credits in climate bill riddled with verification failures and other problems

The landmark climate bill signed by President Joe Biden on Aug. 13 includes billions of dollars in tax credits to encourage carbon capture and sequestration projects. But an IRS investigation of the carbon credit program found that more than half of the $1 billion in credits claimed by oil and gas companies and other industries for carbon capture projects over the last decade were revoked by IRS because the companies failed to verify that the greenhouse gas was actually captured, as required by EPA.