Until recently, Louisiana was the darling of the carbon capture, removal, and storage industry. Due to its history of oil and gas production, the state has a fairly extensive carbon dioxide pipeline network, and ideal geology for storing carbon dioxide. For those reasons, federal incentives to advance point source capture of carbon dioxide (e.g., at industrial facilities and power plants) and its removal directly from the atmosphere have often gone to projects in Louisiana.
Most recently, the Biden administration awarded $50 million to Project Cypress, which aims to develop two direct air capture facilities (i.e., facilities that strip carbon dioxide out of the air) in the Pelican State. The news was welcomed by state leaders, with Governor Jeff Landry declaring that the project “represents the best of Louisiana.” This was a bit of a surprise for a man who had previously called climate change a “hoax” and staunchly opposed Biden administration efforts to advance renewable energy and other climate solutions. The Governor likely does not care much (if at all) about the potential for Project Cypress to help mitigate climate change, but he does like the jobs and other economic benefits it could bring to his state. Indeed, he’s described projects like it as “driving economic growth on a scale unimaginable for Louisiana.”
At the local level, though, carbon capture, removal, and storage projects have been met with growing opposition from Louisiana residents. That opposition is spurring legal action—from communities, local governments, the state legislature, and even Governor Landry—to restrict new projects. The dynamic is, in many ways, similar to what has been seen in the renewable energy space where community opposition has pushed local and state governments to adopt new and increasingly severe restrictions. Could the same be in store for carbon, capture, removal, and storage projects in Louisiana and perhaps beyond? This blog post reviews what has happened to date in Louisiana, what might be coming, and what can be learned from the experience of the renewable energy sector.
Opposition to Carbon Capture, Removal, and Storage
The role that carbon capture, removal, and storage might play in addressing climate change has generated heated debate for many years—not only in Louisiana but across the U.S. and around the world. Some international and national environmental organizations have raised fundamental objections to the technologies, arguing that they are not truly “climate solutions,” but a way for existing industries to maintain the status quo. They assert, for example, that installing carbon capture equipment at fossil fuel power plants will provide an excuse to continue using them even though better alternatives exist. Similar concerns have been raised about carbon removal—that the possibility of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere will reduce incentives to cut emissions. Recently, studies have outlined a range of tools and strategies to prevent that and ensure that emissions reductions and removals are instead used in tandem, as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has said is essential.
While no doubt important, these questions about the role of carbon capture, removal, and storage in mitigating climate change likely aren’t what is driving local opposition in places like Louisiana. Communities tend to be much more concerned about the local impacts of developing such projects. This is unsurprising in a state like Louisiana, where communities have a long history of harm from industrial development. Given this, many are understandably nervous about a new industrial activity coming to their area and keen to understand the risks it might pose. Too often, however, developers have failed to engage with local communities and pushed ahead with projects without local buy-in.
This has been a particular issue in Louisiana in connection with the build-out of carbon dioxide pipelines to support capture and removal projects. A major carbon dioxide pipeline rupture in the town of Satartia, Mississippi, in 2020 put many landowners in neighboring Louisiana on high alert. Subsequent research showing that carbon dioxide pipelines “have a strong overall safety record,” and generally pose lower risks to public health and property than other types of pipelines (e.g., carrying hazardous liquids), has done little to calm their fears. Rather than working with landowners to address their concerns, some developers have reportedly threatened to take their land via eminent domain if they do not agree to lease it for carbon dioxide pipeline projects.
Many Louisiana residents are also concerned about the safety of storing carbon dioxide in underground geologic formations. This is a commonly discussed option for dealing with carbon dioxide once it has been captured. With careful site selection and monitoring, the carbon dioxide can remain locked away for centuries to millennia, with minimal risks (e.g., of carbon dioxide leakage, subsurface migration, and pollution). Research suggests that, rather than being a liability, having a carbon storage facility on or near one’s land can actually increase its value. Still, though, many landowners and communities are concerned about storage wells being developed in their backyards.
Many of the arguments local communities are making against carbon capture, removal, and storage projects echo those made by residents opposing renewable energy development in their area. Both groups frequently point to the potential for harm to the local environment, aesthetic impacts, declines in property values, disruptions from construction activities, and similar local issues to justify their opposition to new development. Research showing that risks are low and/or benefits are significant often carry little weight with the groups. For example, Louisiana State Representative Rodney Schamerhorn recently suggested that studies showing the benefits of carbon capture and storage projects should not be trusted because they “leave out the bad stuff and concentrate on the good stuff.” Developers’ seeming unwillingness to engage with communities in good faith only reinforces this skepticism.
Local Opposition Leads to Local Restrictions
In the renewable energy context, community opposition has prompted many local and some state governments to impose restrictions on new development. (See the Sabin Center’s database on opposition to renewable energy facilities in the U.S. for more information.) The same dynamic is now playing out in the carbon capture, removal, and storage space in Louisiana.
In recent years, Louisiana has seen a flurry of local ordinances aimed at restricting such projects. New Orleans was among the first to act. In May 2022, the city council adopted Resolution No. R-22-219 in which it resolved to “preserve our environment, natural resources, and public health by prohibiting the deployment of any carbon capture and storage … project” in the city. Not long after, in September 2022, Livingston Parish imposed a twelve-month moratorium on the drilling of carbon storage wells in the parish, which was later extended for an additional 3 months (through the end of 2023).
More recently, in May 2025, Allen Parish adopted an ordinance requiring local permits to be obtained for carbon storage projects and establishing mandatory set-back and other conditions for permitted projects. The ordinance was rescinded a few months later, after ExxonMobil Low Carbon Solutions filed a lawsuit, alleging that its adoption exceeded the Parish’s legal authority and was preempted by state law. (Briefly, by way of background, carbon storage projects in Louisiana must be authorized by the state Department of Conservation and Energy, which issues permits for the drilling of storage wells pursuant to authority delegated to it under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act. The Allen Parish ordinance effectively required project developers to obtain an additional permit from local authorities. In its lawsuit challenging the ordinance, ExxonMobil Low Carbon Solutions alleged that it “purports to give the [parish] authority to regulate a field that the Louisiana Legislature wholly occupies and exclusively regulates.”)
Perhaps concerned about facing similar legal challenges, in recent months, several other parishes have adopted ordinances expressing their opposition to carbon storage projects but not actually banning them (see here and here, for example).
Additionally, similar to what we have seen in the renewable energy context, local governments and others are also increasingly using litigation to challenge carbon capture, removal, and storage projects in Louisiana. One notable lawsuit was filed in November by a group of elected officials and residents from Allen, Beauregard, Livingston, Rapides, and Vernon Parishes. They allege that state statutes allowing the use of eminent domain for carbon dioxide pipelines and storage projects violate the Louisiana Constitution. Among other things, the plaintiffs claim that the statutes “divest the citizens of their Constitutionally guaranteed right to property,” result in “improper takings, without just compensation of law and without a public purpose,” and “unconstitutionally provide special privileges and immunities to private corporations.”
In the renewable energy context, several states have responded to local government efforts to restrict new development by limiting local authority over projects (e.g., by giving state agencies exclusive or back-stop authority to site projects). Given their prior support for carbon capture, removal, and storage, one might have expected Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry and other state leaders to do the same here. But, in fact, they’ve done the opposite.
Bowing to public pressure, in October, Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry signed an executive order directing the state Department of Conservation and Energy to suspend the review of new applications for permits for carbon storage wells. The executive order calls on the Department to review its permitting processes and emphasizes, among other things, the need to ensure that “local governments’ views [are] given due consideration.” To this end, the executive order indicates that, moving forward, the department must “document, in writing, all relevant local government concerns received and demonstrate how these comments were taken into account in the permitting decision.” Many want more than that.
Last Week, Louisiana House Speaker Mike Johnson introduced a bill—HB5—which would, if enacted, give local authorities and their residents greater control over the development of carbon dioxide pipelines and storage projects in their area. Among other things, the bill empowers the “governing authority” of a parish to determine, “by resolution or ordinance,” whether “carbon dioxide [storage] and pipelines transporting carbon dioxide may be permitted within the parish.” The bill also allows residents to request that the governing authority call a parish-wide election so that they can vote on whether to allow carbon dioxide storage and pipelines in the parish. If a majority vote against allowing such projects, they “shall be prohibited within the parish,” even if the governing authority has previously agreed to permit them. Moreover, any local determination made by the parish governing authority or voters “shall supersede and preempt any conflicting state or local law, regulation, order, permit or certificate.”
Future Prospects for Carbon Capture, Removal, and Storage in Louisiana
It remains to be seen whether HB5 will pass the state legislature and be signed into law by Governor Landry. But, if it does become law, it could transform the legal landscape for carbon capture, removal, and storage in Louisiana. For a preview of might happen, the state can look to Ohio which, in 2021, enacted legislation authorizing counties to adopt resolutions designating “restricted areas” in which large renewable energy projects are prohibited. Within a year of the law taking effect, 13 counties had designated restricted areas; another 10 did so in 2023 and 4 more in 2024. Given the level of local opposition to carbon capture, removal, and storage in Louisiana, one might expect similar action at the local level if HB5 takes effect.
Overall, the outlook for carbon capture, removal, and storage in Louisiana seems fairly grim. But there is something else, more hopeful, that can be learned from the renewable energy experience—the power of robust community engagement. Research by the Sabin Center and others shows that listening to communities’ concerns, involving them in planning and decision-making regarding proposed projects, and ensuring that they share in the benefits and don’t just feel the harms of those projects (e.g., via community benefits agreements), can help to reduce local opposition and improve the project development process. To date, some carbon capture, removal, and storage project developers have been reluctant to do this. They will need to change their approach if they are to have any hope of advancing projects in Louisiana and perhaps beyond.
Great Job Romany Webb & the Team @ Climate Law Blog Source link for sharing this story.
