From Watts Up With That?

Dr. Lars Schernikau: Energy Economist, Commodity Trader, Author (recent book “The Unpopular Truth… about Electricity and the Future of Energy”)

Details inc the full Blog are available at www.unpopular-truth.com

1. Why CCUS sounds convincing but fails in practice

“Carbon” Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) is widely described as essential for meeting “climate targets”. Most “net-zero” plans assume large amounts of future CO₂ removal to offset emissions that cannot be eliminated.

The question is… does carbon dioxide removal actually work at scale?

The short answer is…no

In my blog post, I examine whether Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR), “Carbon” Capture and Storage (CCS), “Carbon” Capture and Utilisation (CCU), or Direct Air Capture (DAC) actually deliver meaningful climate benefits in practice.

Making use of published data from the IEA, IPCC, BCG, McKinsey, and peer-reviewed literature, I show that CCUS requires large amounts of energy and capital and delivers no measurable climate impact at scale as very little CO₂ is actually removed.

Before dismissing my conclusion as “harsh,” I invite you to read on (full blog here). Let’s look at what these terms really mean, what they aim to achieve, and what the data actually shows.

You can read the full blog here: “Carbon” Capture Utilization & Storage (CCUS)

2. Why carbon dioxide removal exists

In its Summary for Policymakers, the IPCC states that “net-zero” emissions must be reached “as quickly as possible” to limit global warming. Unlike emissions-reduction measures, which limit how much CO₂ is released, Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) is defined as activities that remove CO₂ from the atmosphere and store it securely and long-term.

This distinction matters because “net-zero” cannot be reached through emissions reductions alone and therefore large future volumes of CO₂ removal are assumed. This is why CCS and DAC continue to attract policy attention and investment despite limited real-world results.

3. What are we really capturing?

Despite the name, “carbon capture” does not capture carbon. It captures carbon dioxide (CO₂), a big difference, but let’s ignore that for now…

Carbon itself is a solid element and a basic building block of life. Roughly a quarter of the human body is carbon, and almost all of it ultimately comes from atmospheric CO₂, if you wish the real building block of life. Plants absorb CO₂, animals and humans eat plants, and we exhale most of that carbon again.

Fact 1: CO₂ is not inherently a pollutant. It is a trace gas and a fundamental input to life.

4. CO₂ and warming: Diminishing “returns”

CO₂ makes up about 0.04% of the atmosphere.

Fact 2: CO₂ is a trace gas that acts as a minor greenhouse gas, with diminishing impact on temperatures

Water vapour and clouds account for most of the so called “greenhouse effect” that makes Earth a liveable planet. Crucially, CO₂’s warming effect decreases logarithmically. means that additional CO₂ translates into smaller and smaller temperature changes.

5.  How much CO₂ has CCS actually removed?

After nearly 30 years, global CCS has captured less than 400 million tons of CO₂. Much of this was used for enhanced oil recovery, not permanent storage. Realistically, only 100-200 million tons were ever truly removed, at a cost of tens of billions of dollars.

Today, global CCS capacity is about 50 million tons per year, while global emissions (including CH4 at GWP20) are roughly 70 billion tons per year. CCS remains a million-tons technology, while climate plans assume billion-tons deployment.

That gap is not political. It is physical.

6. The energy penalty no one likes to discuss

Capturing CO₂ is energy-intensive.

Adding CCS to a modern coal power plant reduces efficiency by 25–30%. When additional fuel mining, transport, compression, and CO₂ handling are included, the plant requires about 40% more primary energy to deliver the same electricity.

Fact 3: For a modern coal-fired power plant with ~90% CCS, the all-in primary-energy requirement per delivered MWh is typically ~40% higher than without CCS

This includes additional coal consumption, capture and compression, increased mining, handling and transport of the extra coal, and CO₂ transport and injection for storage, assuming all CO₂ is permanently removed, which in practice is not the case.

In simple terms: more fuel is burned to hide the exhaust.

CCS does not “clean” energy systems. It makes them larger, more complex, and less efficient.

Fact 4: The “energy cost of CCS” for a coal-fired power station is about 1 MWh per 1 ton of CO₂ 

Considering the fuel multiplier for gas-fired power plants with CCS, we are looking at about 25% less, because gas-fired power stations tend to be more fuel efficient, despite the smaller CO₂ concentration in the exhaust stream.

Germany, for instance, plans to capture about 2 million tons of CO₂ per year…at that scale, the “climate impact” is negligible.

Australia’s flagship Gorgon CCS project was approved on the condition it would capture 80% of reservoir CO₂. In reality, it captured less than half that amount in 2024. These examples show the same pattern of high ambition, but poor delivery.

7.  Using CO₂ doesn’t remove it

“Carbon” Capture and Utilisation (CCU) turns CO₂ into products, often fuels. But CO₂ is already fully oxidised. Turning it into fuel requires large amounts of additional energy, mainly hydrogen.

Producing fuels from CO₂ typically consumes 8–10+ MWh per tons of CO₂, and the CO₂ is released again when the fuel is burned.

The most common use today is enhanced oil recovery (EOR) which is economically sensible, energy-positive, and climatically questionable. EOR is a set of techniques used to extract oil that cannot be produced using normal primary or secondary methods.

Fact 5: CO₂ utilization to produce fuels represents an additional energy sink, and one that is more energy-intensive than CO₂ capture and storage CCS. 

Fact 6: Producing fuels from CO₂ using hydrogen carries a total system-level energy cost of 8–10+ MWh per tonne of CO₂, and the CO₂ is ultimately still released into the atmosphere. The “energy cost” for producing and refining oil is significantly lower.

8. Direct air capture is like fighting physics…

Direct Air Capture tries to remove CO₂ from ambient air, where concentrations are just 0.04%.

That extreme dilution means enormous volumes of air must be moved. Most of the energy is spent moving air, not capturing CO₂. Even optimistic estimates suggest 2–4 MWh per tons.

Removing 1 billion tons per year would require roughly 8–15% of global electricity production.

DAC is technically possible but practically unscalable.

Fact 7: Enhanced Oil Recovery it the most common utilization of CO₂, with questionable “climate benefits”  if any at all. However, it makes economic sense and is energy positive because it produces oil that would otherwise not be recoverable.

9. What is the climate impact?

Fact 9: Assuming that, during the past 30 year, CCUS removed about 200 million tons of CO₂ (that never resurfaced) from the atmosphere then, according to IPCCs MAGICC, 2100 temperatures reduced by ≈ 0.0001 °C

• Let’s round this up to zero as one cannot measure it, nor will it have any impact at all on extreme weather nor sea-levels

Even removing 1 billion tons per year for 75 years would reduce warming by only ~0.035°C which is below detectability, with no measurable impact on extreme weather or sea level rise and would only be true if IPCC models and assumptions are correct, which is in serious dispute.

10. The bottom line?

Carbon Dioxide Removal does not solve the climate problem at scale. It shifts emissions into complex engineered systems that must remain stable for centuries, while consuming vast amounts of energy and resources.

The climate benefits are negligible. The costs are enormous.

Those resources could instead deliver far greater benefit through efficiency, infrastructure, pollution control, health, education, and resilience.

That conclusion is not ideological…It follows directly from the data!

Continue reading the full blog here: “Carbon” Capture Utilization & Storage (CCUS)