CAN conclusions on CCS

Climate Action Network (comprising around 1500 NGOs/networks worldwide) has published a new 21-page position paper on carbon capture and storage with 100 scientific references. Based on current global trends and an analysis of existing literature and reports, CAN draws the following conclusions on CCS and its potential to serve as a climate-mitigation tool:

1. CCS at scale remains largely unproven and its potential to deliver significant emission reductions by mid-century is currently limited.

2. Safe, permanent, and verifiable storage of CO₂ is difficult to guarantee.

3. The climate impact of CCS should consider all emissions and costs from concomitant processes.

4. CCS is not needed in the power sector. Faster, cleaner, safer, more efficient, and cheaper means exist to reduce CO₂ emissions, such as phasing out fossil fuels and replacing them with renewable energy, energy efficiency, and energy conservation.

5. Enhanced oil and gas recovery is dangerously at odds with any climate action and will not lower emissions in comparison to renewable energy and energy efficiency. To meet the Paris Agreement target, the majority of fossil fuel reserves must be left in the ground.

6. A suite of strategies and technologies already exist to cut emissions in the industrial sector, without CCS. Emissions in the industrial sector can be significantly reduced by increasing process efficiency, but there is also a need to increase the speed of development and/or deployment of low- or zero-carbon processes and materials, replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy, increasing recycling rates, and designing alternative materials with lower emission footprints than steel, conventional cements, plastics and aluminium.

CAN strongly supports further and internationally coordinated research, development and deployment for CO₂-free processes and alternative materials to ensure that energy-intensive industries eliminate all emissions by mid-century at the latest.

Reinhold Pape

The position paper can be found here:

https://climatenetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/can_position_carbo...