EU Reaches Deal to Certify, Monitor Carbon Removal Activities

Two employees work on pipes carrying liquid CO2 at the Schwarze Pumpe power station in Brandenburg, Germany, on Sept. 8, 2008. Michael Urban/ DDP/AFP via Getty Images

Two legislative bodies of the European Union (EU) reached a tentative agreement on Feb. 20 over new rules for the voluntary certification, registration, and monitoring of carbon removals within the bloc.

The European Council and the European Parliament agreed to define and regulate permanent carbon removals, carbon farming, and carbon storage in products to address climate change, according to a statement from the council.

According to the resolution on sustainable carbon cycles, which was adopted in April 2023 by the European Parliament, carbon removals “must play a growing role in achieving EU climate neutrality by 2050.” That’s to “balance out emissions that cannot be eliminated,” according to the legislators’ statement.

The deal reached is still provisional, pending formal adoption by the European Parliament and the council. The new law covers the certification of four types of carbon removals, according to the statement:

• Permanent carbon removal to storage for a duration of several centuries
• Temporary carbon storage in long-lasting products for a duration of at least 35 years. Example: wood-based construction
• Temporary carbon storage from carbon farming for a duration of at least five years. Examples are restored forests and soil, wetlands, and seagrass meadows
• Reduction of carbon emission from farmed soil for a duration of at least five years. Examples are wetland management, no tilling and planting cover crops such as grasses, legumes, and forbs, and reduced use of fertilizer

Although the regulations will apply to activities taking place in the EU, the statement said the commission “should consider the possibility of allowing geological carbon storage in neighboring third countries, provided they align with EU environmental and safety standards.”

According to the statement, the European Commission will develop detailed certification methods with the assistance of an expert group.

Benefits of Carbon Removal

Each metric ton of CO2 removed through carbon capture activities certified under the new law counts as a contribution toward the EU’s and its member states’ greenhouse gas emission reduction goals under the Paris Agreement, the statement said.

The Paris Agreement requires each participating country to report to the United Nations every five years on its contributions to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The new legislation stipulates that certification and audit information must be made public. An electronic EU-wide registry will be established after four years. Fees will be charged for querying the registry, and the income from these fees will be used to fund the registry, according to the statement.

The initiative to certify carbon removal was initially proposed by the commission in November 2022. Carbon removal certificates will underpin “the exchange of verified carbon removal units through voluntary carbon offsetting markets,” the commission said in the proposal.

Certifying carbon removal will potentially create new income opportunities for industries deploying carbon removal and storage technologies and for farmers engaging in innovative carbon farming, the statement said.

“The agreement reached today on this important piece of legislation will make the EU a global leader in carbon removals,” Lídia Pereira, a member of the European Parliament representing Portugal and the rapporteur for the legislation, said in a statement on Feb. 20. “It will foster private investment and develop the voluntary carbon markets while respecting climate integrity and preventing greenwashing.”

Methods Have Limitations

Fabian Frucht, a land manager of the Succow Stiftung Foundation, walks on a rewetted portion of the Sernitzmoor peatland near Greiffenberg, Germany, on May 31, 2023 Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Soil-based carbon sequestration through carbon farming methods has limitations, according to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

To achieve the greenhouse gas reduction goal, many farmers worldwide need to change how they farm the land for hundreds of years in the future, which poses “a big social and economic challenge,” the MIT climate portal said.

In 2020, researchers at the University of California–San Diego studied projects commercializing carbon capture and sequestration technology in the past 20 years and concluded that 80 percent of those projects failed, according to the university’s statement.

The researchers found that the credibility of revenues and incentives which depend on policy and politics, “along with capital cost and technological readiness,” are key factors in the success of these projects. The only major incentive that the companies studied had was to recoup their investments by selling the CO2 they captured to petrochemical companies, which used it to enhance oil and gas extraction, the university said in the statement.

In 2022, the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) estimated that, since the commercialization of carbon capture and storage technology in the 1970s, it has been primarily used for enhancing oil recovery. According to the institute’s analysis, only about 10–20 percent of projects have utilized it to store carbon in dedicated geological structures.

“Carbon capture only captures a fraction of the total emissions from the lifecycle of oil and gas production, and its long-term efficacy is questionable,” the IEEFA said.

“Even if the carbon dioxide can be injected underground, there is no guarantee that it will stay there and not leak into the atmosphere,” the IEEFA added, citing the failure of the In Salah project in Algeria, which was suspended in 2011 after seven years of operations “due to concerns about the integrity of the seal and suspicious movements of the trapped carbon dioxide under the ground.”

Carbon Storage in Norway

Cranes and vehicles at a construction site at the start of construction work for a terminal that will collect liquefied carbon dioxide CO2, in Oygarden near Bergen, Norway, on June 21, 2021. Alexiane Lerouge/AFP via Getty Images

Norway has extensive experience with carbon dioxide capture and storage and operates successful projects at the Sleipner and Snohvit sites, which are the only carbon management projects in operation in Europe today, according to the Norwegian government’s website.

Sleipner has been in operation since 1996 and Snohvit since 2008. Both sites, run by Norwegian state-owned energy company Equinor, store CO2 separated during natural gas production and inject it back underground.

However, IEEFA adviser Grant Hauber said in a 2023 report that the to-date experience with Sleipner and Snohvit “casts doubt on whether the world has the technical prowess, strength of regulatory oversight, and unwavering multi-decade commitment of capital and resources needed to keep carbon dioxide sequestered below the sea–as the Earth needs–permanently.”

“While the oil and gas industry is used to dealing with uncertainty in exploration and production, the risks multiply when trying to place something like CO2 back in the ground,” Mr. Hauber said in a statement.

“Storage conditions at Snohvit began deviating dramatically from design plans only about 18 months into CO2 injections, necessitating major interventions and investments. In the case of Sleipner, CO2 moved into an area previously unidentified by engineers despite extensive study of the subsurface geology,” the statement said.