North Sea CCS project faces limits in offsetting regional emissions

A carbon capture and storage (CCS) project in the North Sea, where Denmark previously drilled for oil, is nearing completion and will store imported European carbon dioxide beneath the seabed. The project is part of broader efforts to reduce emissions from hard-to-decarbonise industries such as cement and steel.

Truls Gulowsen, head, Friends of the Earth Norway saud "It's a very compelling narrative that the area that was the source of the problem can now be the source of the solution, but it's not really that we're seeing. It's much, much more fossil fuels and climate emissions that comes out of the North Sea than we will ever be able to put back with CCS."

CCS technology is recognized by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the International Energy Agency as a tool to mitigate global warming, though experts note it cannot fully offset the region’s ongoing fossil fuel emissions.