Finance
Britain launches second carbon capture licensing round
Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on December 9, 2025
Last updated: January 8, 2026
Global Banking and Finance Review
Company
Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on December 9, 2025
Last updated: January 8, 2026
LONDON, Dec 9 (Reuters) - Britain launched its second-ever carbon capture licensing round on Tuesday for 14 locations that could potentially store up to 2 gigatons of carbon dioxide, the North Sea Transition Authority regulator said.
Carbon capture technology can help to decarbonise industrial sites such as gas-fired power plants by filtering emissions before they reach the air and storing the CO2 in depleted oil and gas fields or other underground rock structures.
But making such projects commercially viable is difficult in the context of a fragmented carbon price landscape, typically leaving them dependent on government subsidies.
Britain awarded 21 carbon capture licenses in 2023. In terms of receiving actual permits to proceed towards CO2 injection, so far only two projects - Endurance and HyNet, which predate the 2023 licensing round - have reached that stage.
The new licensing round will run until March 24, 2026, the NSTA said, adding licensing would likely be awarded in early 2027.
(Reporting by Shadia Nasralla; Editing by Andrea Ricci )
Carbon capture is a technology that captures carbon dioxide emissions from sources like power plants and stores it underground to prevent it from entering the atmosphere.
Depleted oil and gas fields are areas where oil and gas have been extracted, and they can be repurposed for storing carbon dioxide captured from industrial processes.
A carbon price is a cost applied to carbon emissions, intended to encourage businesses to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by making it financially beneficial to do so.
The North Sea Transition Authority is a regulatory body in the UK responsible for overseeing the transition to a low-carbon economy, including managing carbon capture and storage projects.
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