Carbon Capture Coalition Policy Blueprint on Federal Carbon Capture Policies

The Carbon Capture Coalition has released a first-ever national policy blueprint outlining a comprehensive set of policy priorities to promote economywide deployment of carbon capture technologies.

The blueprint represents a consensus of the Coalition’s more than 60 energy, industrial and technology companies, labor unions, and conservation, environmental, clean energy and agricultural organizations. It serves as a federal policy roadmap for continued development and deployment of carbon capture, transport, utilization, removal and storage industries in the United States.

“Last year’s bipartisan reform of the federal Section 45Q tax credit marked a foundational first step in fostering continued growth of the American carbon capture industry,” declared Carbon Capture Coalition co-director Brad Crabtree. “Now, Carbon Capture Coalition participants have crafted this Blueprint to outline additional federal policies needed going forward to build on the 45Q tax credit and further expand commercial deployment of technologies that will deliver environmental, energy and jobs benefits for our entire nation.”

The Coalition’s strategic vision for future policy action encompasses carbon capture, transport, utilization, removal and storage and includes the following priorities:

• Ensuring effective implementation of 45Q by the U.S. Treasury to provide the investment certainty and business model flexibility intended by Congress;

• Providing additional federal incentives to complement, expand and build upon 45Q in financing projects;

• Incorporating carbon capture into broader national infrastructure policy; and

• Expanding, retooling and prioritizing federal funding for research, development, demonstration and deployment (RDD&D) of next generation technologies and practices.

Released during the second CO2NNECT 2019 national carbon capture conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, the blueprint is ambitious, comprehensive and bipartisan. It provides specific recommendations for federal action arranged in four complementary areas: investment certainty; technology deployment and cost reductions; project finance and feasibility; and infrastructure deployment.

“Federal and state policies have succeeded in helping to scale up wind, solar and other low and zero-carbon energy technologies in the marketplace. Carbon capture needs a similarly comprehensive and ambitious suite of policy tools and incentives to achieve economywide deployment in the next decade,” Crabtree said, noting that the Coalition defines economywide deployment as a critical mass of commercial-scale capture projects developed in key industrial sectors and power generation between now and 2030.

As the conclusion of the Blueprint states, “This policy blueprint makes clear that expansion of federal policies and investments in carbon capture, utilization, removal and storage and in CO2 pipeline infrastructure is needed to bring down emissions, protect and create high-wage jobs and promote economic opportunities in the management and beneficial use of carbon. A comprehensive and robust federal policy agenda can help the U.S. sustain its position as a global leader in the commercialization and deployment of these crucial energy and industrial technologies and infrastructure.”

Download the report: https://carboncapturecoalition.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/BluePrint-Compressed.pdf