CCS Europe Newsletter 

HEADLINE NEWS

🕵️‍♀️ Article 23 gets a watchdog. Three heavyweights - Clean Air Task Force, Carbon Balance Initiative, and Bellona Europa - have teamed up to keep oil and gas producers honest under Article 23 of the EU’s Net-Zero Industry Act. The rule requires fossil fuel companies to help build CO₂ injection capacity, but enforcement will make or break it. Their new joint project includes a tracker, policy briefs, and a roadmap for long-term accountability. Find out more.

🔍 From paper to pipelines. The goal? Ensure the EU actually hits its 50Mt CO₂ storage target by 2030 - and doesn’t stop there. With industry dragging its feet and storage markets still in infancy, this initiative aims to be the pressure valve, progress monitor, and megaphone needed to turn Article 23 into real climate impact.

🧯 An obligation to store April closed the public consultation on the draft Delegated Act tied to the EU’s 2030 CO₂ storage target. It spells out how the storage obligation will work as the EU moves towards building 50Mt of injection capacity by 2030. Companies now have until June 30 to submit their storage game plans. No plan, no play.

💶 Your two cents on State aid: Also in April: the consultation on the State aid framework tied to the Clean Industrial Deal. The Commission wants to fast-track decarbonisation (and clean tech manufacturing) by tweaking the rules that govern public funding. Stakeholders had until April 25 to weigh in on how much flexibility Member States should get to back industrial decarb without breaking competition laws. CCS Europe submitted responses to both consultations – more below.

OUR ACTIVITIES

📌 NZIA: Storage target’s good - now make it stick. In our response, we backed the EU’s push to scale up CO₂ storage—but warned the Delegated Act needs stronger teeth. Exemption rules are vague, reporting must go deeper, and there’s still no guidance on penalties. With 2030 fast approaching, every delay shrinks the runway. Read the full response.

📌 State Aid: CCS deserves better. Our take? CCS should get the same funding treatment as hydrogen—full stop. We called out the low aid cap (30% vs 50%), missing support for transport/storage, and a 36-month deadline that’s wildly unrealistic for most projects. Read the full response.

📊 Grading the plans: NECPs under the CCS microscope. At a webinar hosted by Carbon Capture Journal, our CCS adviser and former Director, Chris Davies, gave the lowdown on how CCS shows up (or doesn’t) in Member States’ National Energy and Climate Plans. He introduced CCS Europe’s grading scale to rank NECPs - because if we’re serious about hitting targets, we need to track who’s doing their homework. Check out our NECP map.

🛤️ Missing link in net-zero? Transport. Carbon capture gets the headlines, but transport is the unsung hero. Our latest paper flags the EU’s slow progress on CO₂ networks and calls for urgent action to connect emitters to storage - before time runs out. Download the full paper.

CCS DEVELOPMENTS FROM AROUND THE BLOC

EIB backs negative emissions with €260M. Stockholm Exergi just scored the EIB’s first-ever CCS loan to build one of Europe’s largest BECCS plants. Once it’s up and running in 2028, it’ll lock away 800,000 tonnes of CO₂ per year - more than all of Stockholm’s road traffic coughs out annually. Read the full press release.

Denmark’s cement sector gets a CCS injection - €220M worth. ACCSION is officially go. Air Liquide and Cementir Holding just inked a €220 million grant deal with the EU Innovation Fund to kick off carbon capture at the Aalborg cement plant. Once live, it’ll slash emissions by 1.5 million tonnes a year - that’s the equivalent of wiping out the annual CO₂ output of 750,000 cars. Read more.

LOOKING AHEAD: MAY 👀