Confronting the Myth of Carbon-Free Fossil Fuels
Why Carbon Capture Is Not a Climate Solution
This briefing was published by the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL).
The world is confronting a climate emergency. Avoiding climate catastrophe requires immediate and dramatic reductions in greenhouse gas emissions that are possible only with a significant investment of public resources in proven mitigation measures, beginning with eliminating fossil fuel use and halting deforestation.
Carbon capture and storage, or CCS, and carbon capture, utilization and storage, or CCUS, are processes designed to collect or “capture” carbon dioxide generated by high-emitting activities and then transport those captured emissions to sites where they are used for industrial processes or stored underground. While both are proposed as technologies to meet global energy and climate goals, CCS and CCUS will not address these core drivers of the climate crisis or meaningfully reduce greenhouse emissions, and should not distract from real climate solutions.
This briefing, published by the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), examines how CCS and CCUS technologies are not only unnecessary for the rapid transformation required to keep warming under 1.5°C but how they delay that transformation, providing the fossil fuel industry with a license to continue polluting.
The views and opinions expressed in the publication are those of the mentioned organisation and do not necessarily reflect the position of all Real Zero Europe members.
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