There Are Fortunes to Be Made in the Carbon Capture Gold Rush (in US)

Past efforts to capture carbon dioxide (CCS) have been small-scale and littered with failures. But now supporters say the new tax incentives in the US Inflation Reduction Act are transformative enough that, combined with the lessons of the past 20 years, the technology is finally ready to take off.

This new law also increases the amount of the credit from $45 a ton to $85, for CO2 removed from a smokestack, and as much as $180 if the gas is taken from the air.

Since the 45Q form is an uncapped credit, it’s impossible to say how much money will be tapped by entrepreneurs who apply for it.

That is why the name of this article from Bloomberg: "There Are Fortunes to Be Made in the Carbon Capture Gold Rush". Analysts at Credit Suisse Group AG predicted the number to be close to $52 billion.

Many environmentalists oppose the CCS incentives, which they argue will only dangerously extend our use of fossil fuels. On the other hand, energy modelers predict that the amount of carbon captured in the US will rise from the current 12 million to 25 million metric tons a year to 200 million metric tons by 2030.

Here are the cases of some companies mentioned in the article :

• Lehigh Hanson Inc., one of the largest concrete makers in the US, will start running a new cement plant that could capture 95% of its carbon dioxide emissions by 2028.

• Air Products Inc. is starting work on a $4.5 billion facility just south of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, that could become the world’s biggest carbon sequestration operation.

• CarbonCapture Inc., expects to pull 5 million metric tons of CO2 a year directly from the air by the end of the decade.

• Drax Group, a British-based bioenergy and carbon capture company, is taking investors’ money for plants that would suck 12 million metric tons of CO2 out of the atmosphere.

• Calpine Corp., US largest operator of gas-fired power plants, has earmarked 11 plants for carbon capture and is working on engineering plans to retrofit four more.

Click at the image below to read more, Bloomberg's article. And here for Carbon Credit Market articles about CCS.