UK announces $29 billion for carbon capture projects

LONDON

The U.K. government on Oct. 4 announced investment of nearly 22 billion pounds ($28.8 billion) in projects to capture and store carbon emissions created by industry and energy production.

The money will fund "carbon capture clusters" in Merseyside, northwest England, and Teesside, northeast England.

The new Labour government has launched a new public-owned body, Great British Energy, to spur investment in domestic renewable projects and quicken the pace of the move to cleaner power.

It hopes the new projects will create 4,000 jobs and support another 50,000 over the next 25 years and help the U.K. meet its climate targets by removing 8.5 million tons of carbon emissions each year.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the projects were "reigniting our industrial heartlands by investing in the industry of the future."

Carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) is a technology that seeks to eliminate emissions created by burning fuels for energy and from industrial processes.

The carbon is captured and then stored permanently in various underground environments.

The International Energy Agency believes it could be a crucial weapon in the fight against emission-driven climate change.

The 21.7 billion pounds will subsidise three projects in Teesside and Merseyside -- two areas of the UK that have suffered from the decline of heavy industry.

It will also help fund transport and storage networks to move the carbon to geological storage in Liverpool Bay and the North Sea.

The first carbon dioxide is set to be stored from 2028.