Recommendation 24

The Government’s recent confirmation of £20 billion investment over 20 years for the early development of Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is welcome, allowing the implementation of the initial clusters to commence. However, none of this £20 billion is reflected in the formal budget policy costings, so it is unclear how it will be raised. The Government will need to come forward promptly with clarity for projects involved in the Track 1 expansion and Track 2 clusters. We recommend that the Government announces the cluster sequencing Track-1 expansion projects as quickly as possible and provides further detail on the forward timeline for selecting the next CCS clusters that need to be operational this decade. We urge the Government to provide clarity on how the £20 billion for the early development of CCS will be funded. The Government should develop a robust regulatory regime that tests the carbon capture rates of CCS facilities and penalises failure, which in turn should drive innovation.