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Climate Politics

Biden’s Plan to Cut Power Emissions Hinges on Little-Used Carbon Capture

The EPA will require many facilities to capture their planet-warming pollution, an approach welcomed by environmentalists that faces logistical and legal hurdles.

The Petra Nova Carbon Capture Project at the NRG Energy WA Parish generating station in Thompsons, Texas in 2017.

The Petra Nova Carbon Capture Project at the NRG Energy WA Parish generating station in Thompsons, Texas in 2017.

Photographer: Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg

One of the Biden administration’s most important efforts to flight climate change, slashing greenhouse gases from the electricity sector, hinges on carbon capture technology that’s barely in commercial use at power plants and faces daunting legal and logistical hurdles.

The approach, set to be unveiled this week, is already butting up against obstacles. Delays are mounting to dig wells and build pipelines and other infrastructure necessary for a wave of projects to capture and store greenhouse gases from coal and natural-gas plants. Skeptics, meanwhile, say the technology hasn’t yet been “adequately demonstrated” — a legal threshold for the government’s embrace of it under the Clean Air Act.