World’s First Commercial CO2 Storage Site Launched in Norway

The Northern Lights consortium announced on Monday that it has completed the first-ever CO2 injection into the North Sea seabed, marking a milestone for the world’s first commercial carbon storage service off Norway’s coast.

Operated by oil giants Equinor, Shell, and TotalEnergies, Northern Lights transports CO2 captured from industrial smokestacks across Europe and stores it safely beneath the seabed to prevent it from entering the atmosphere, helping slow climate change.

“We now injected and stored the very first CO2 safely in the reservoir,” said Northern Lights’ managing director Tim Heijn. “Our ships, facilities, and wells are now in operation.”

Captured CO2 is liquefied and shipped to the Oygarden terminal near Bergen. From there, it is transferred into large tanks and injected through a 110-kilometre pipeline into the seabed at a depth of around 2.6 kilometres for permanent storage.

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is recognized by the UN’s IPCC and the International Energy Agency as a vital climate tool, especially for hard-to-decarbonize sectors like cement and steel. The first injection came from Germany’s Heidelberg Materials cement plant in Brevik, Norway.

However, CCS remains expensive. Without subsidies, many industries find it more economical to buy “pollution permits” than invest in capturing and storing CO2. Northern Lights currently has three commercial contracts in Europe: with a Yara ammonia plant in the Netherlands, two Orsted biofuel plants in Denmark, and the Stockholm Exergi thermal power plant in Sweden.

Funded largely by the Norwegian government, Northern Lights has an annual CO2 storage capacity of 1.5 million tonnes, expected to rise to five million tonnes by 2030.