Norway opens world’s first commercial CO2 ‘graveyard’

Norway has launched the world’s first commercial offshore carbon storage service, carrying out its first-ever CO2 injection beneath the North Sea, the Northern Lights consortium announced Monday.

The project, jointly run by Equinor, Shell and TotalEnergies, is designed to capture carbon dioxide from industrial sites across Europe, transport it by ship, and permanently store it underground to keep it out of the atmosphere.

“We have safely stored the first CO2 in the reservoir,” Northern Lights Managing Director Tim Heijn said, confirming that the ships, terminal and wells are now fully operational.

Captured CO2 is cooled into liquid form, moved to a storage terminal in Oygarden near Bergen, and then pumped through a 110-kilometre pipeline to a depth of about 2.6 kilometres below the seabed.

The technology, known as carbon capture and storage (CCS), is highlighted by the UN and the International Energy Agency as vital for reducing emissions from sectors like cement and steel. The first CO2 load came from Heidelberg Materials’ cement plant in Brevik, Norway.

Despite its potential, CCS remains costly, with industries often opting to buy carbon credits instead of paying for storage. So far, Northern Lights has three signed contracts in Europe, including with Yara in the Netherlands, Denmark’s Ørsted biofuel plants, and Stockholm Exergi in Sweden.

Financed largely by the Norwegian government, the project currently has a storage capacity of 1.5 million tonnes of CO2 annually, with plans to increase to five million tonnes by 2030.