Northern Lights: Europe’s First Cross-Border CO₂ Hub

As CO₂ concentrations increase in the atmosphere due to fossil fuel consumption, the effect on the planet’s climate might turn irreversible, even if no more oil, coal, or gas is ever again consumed tomorrow. And of course, we are very far from it, with fossil fuels still providing the world most of its primary energy, even with quickly rising renewable energy production and an ongoing rebirth of the nuclear industry.

“To reach net-zero globally we’ll have to remove up to 10 billion tonnes of CO₂ per year by 2050.”

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

This is why carbon capture projects are becoming so important. We already covered a few major ones, like the Mammoth Facility in Iceland (36,000 tons of CO₂ per year) or STRATOS in Texas (500,000 tons of CO₂ per year).

These facilities are a good start, but they alone are not enough. First, they often rely on the not-so-liquid or stable markets for carbon credits. And they also tend to operate for the benefit of only one company.

Another even larger project is now active, the Northern Lights Project. When fully ramped up, it will store up to 5,000,000 tons of CO₂ per year and will be the world’s first cross-border CO₂ transport and storage facility.

This hub was created from the collaboration between major European oil companies and will greatly contribute to reducing the net CO₂ emissions of the region.

Northern Light Project History

The Northern Light Project is the endpoint of an even larger carbon capture project, Longship. The plan is to organize the capture of carbon emissions at factories and power plants, load it in ships, and deliver this cargo to Øygarden in Norway. There, the CO₂ is processed and injected via a subsea pipe into permanent underground storage.

The entire project is managed by Gassnova, the Norwegian state enterprise for carbon capture and storage, established by the country in 2005.

Source: Gassnova

The project saw its first feasibility studies in 2016. It was followed in 2017 by the partnership of all three current oil companies involved with the project: Equinor (EQNR), Shell (SHEL ), and TotalEnergies (TTE).

The project was awarded its first exploration license for CO₂ storage in 2019, and the final investment decision was made in 2020 to drill the Eos well.

The Northern Lights Joint Venture (JV) was formally formed in 2021, and the project signed in August 2022 its first commercial agreement for cross-border CO₂ transport and storage with Yara International (YAR.OL), a large fertilizer company.

The construction of the project was finished in 2024, with the first CO₂ injection in August 2025. In March 2026, the project achieved a new milestone by injecting its first CO₂ captured from wastewater sources, from the Veas wastewater treatment plant in Slemmestad near Oslo.

The initial capacity is already fully booked as other companies like Heidelberg Materials (HEI.DE), a cement producer, have also joined.

The project’s capacity will be expanded from the current 1.5 million tons of CO₂ to 5 million tons by 2028.

Northern Light Project Concept

Building A CO₂ Transportation Network

The idea behind the Northern Light project is to first focus on limiting further carbon emissions, especially for industries that are especially hard to decarbonize, like fertilizer and cement production.

The carbon is captured directly on these industrial sites, for example, in the case of Heidelberg Materials’ cement factory.

As part of Longship, Heidelberg Materials’ facility in Brevik became the world’s first cement factory equipped with CO₂ capture. A 103-metre-tall absorber tower filled with a chemical called amine that binds the CO₂, which is separated as a gas. It is then liquefied and pumped into storage tanks on the quayside, ready for transport.

Source: Northern Lights

Northern Light can also help create net capture of CO₂ while using energy. For example, the project will sequester 280,000 tonnes of CO₂ per year from the woodchip-fired Asnæs Power Station in Kalundborg, turning the transient carbon capture of trees (lasting only until they are burned) into a permanent carbon removal tool.

Transport is ensured by 130-meter-long ships (425 feet) designed by Shell engineers, each capable of transporting 7,500 cubic meters of CO₂ in a single voyage, or enough to fill three Olympic-sized swimming pools.

Source: Shell

The ships are designed to be as energy efficient as possible and to emit as few emissions as possible. They run mainly on liquefied natural gas (LNG) and use wind-assisted rotor sail, motorized spinning cylinders that harness wind power to help propel the ship forward.

In addition, an air lubrication system makes the ships more efficient by releasing bubbles along the hulls, which reduces friction with the water. This reduces the carbon intensity of the vessels by about 34% compared with conventional ships.

Four more ships will be added to the CO₂ transport fleet, each with a 12,000 m³ cargo capacity, to be delivered in the period from the second half of 2028 to the first half of 2029.

“Together we are pioneers in building the first dedicated CO₂ shipping fleet. This experience will benefit Northern Lights, our customers and the CCS industry for the years to come.”

Tim Heijn, Managing Director in Northern Lights.

The liquefied CO₂ is transferred from the ships into a dozen tanks on the shore of Øygarden. The CO₂ is then pumped into a 110-kilometer (68 miles) subsea pipeline going through a fjord into the North Sea.

Source: Gassnova

Upgrading To 5 Mt of CO₂ Capacity

Phase 1 of the operation will sequester 1.5 million tons of CO₂ per year. But the undersea deposit could transit a lot more in the future, as the limiting factor is the ship docking and onshore storage capacity.

To increase capacity, phase 2 of the project is now being built. It will add nine new onshore storage tanks, new pumps, a new jetty, two new offshore injection wells, and an extended subsea pipeline system.

Source: Northern Lights

Together with the additional four more ships, this would make Northern Lights one of the world’s largest carbon capture facilities, only smaller than the ExxonMobil Chute Creek and Petrobras Santos Basin.

But as these two facilities capture carbon directly from natural processing facilities, it could be argued that Northern Light is the largest “true” carbon capture facility, avoiding emissions in other industries and not “encouraging” fossil fuel production.

Durable Carbon Capture

The site chosen to store the carbon is far off the coast of Norway, a 2.6 km deep saline aquifer. This was the result of a long-term effort by Gassnova to identify the right type of geological conditions that would be ideal for CO₂ storage.

3D seismic data were collected as early as 2008, and a full report (“One North Sea“) about the region’s potential was published in 2010. Final choice of the best reservoir was made in 2014-2020.

The chosen aquifer has two primary storage units (sand reservoirs) and an overlaying sealing layer (cap rock) that ensures the CO₂ containment.

The sand reservoirs have pore space between a rock framework, and this porous space is currently filled with brine (saline water). The CO₂ will displace the brine and stay trapped in the porous space, where a small portion will mineralise, some of it will dissolve in the brine, and most of it will be permanently structurally trapped.

The site has the potential to store up to an estimated capacity of at least 100 million tonnes, or more than 20 years at current capacity.

The area also contains other potential CO₂ storage sites, so the existing infrastructure will be usable for decades at a minimum, notably the Smeaheia (20 million tonnes capacity) and the Troll Fields, which, once natural production is over, could store up to 3 to 5 billion tons of CO₂.

In total, the sandstone layers beneath just the North Sea could hold up to 100 billion tons of CO₂, and accommodate up to 40 million tons of injections per year.

Source: Gassnova

Part Of The Greater Picture

Northern Lights is only one part of Norway and Europe’s effort to increase carbon capture capacities.

For example, nearby North Sea projects are multiplying, although many will not be ready for several years in the future, notably:

• The Greensand Future in Denmark, another offshore carbon storage project with 400,000 tons of CO₂ yearly capacity.
• Porthos in the Netherlands with a 2.5 million tonnes of CO₂ yearly capacity.
• HyNet North West in the UK with a 4.5 million tonnes of CO₂ yearly capacity.

And other regions of Europe are also moving in storing carbon, for example, Romania’s CARBON HUB CPT01 with a capacity of 2 million tons of CO₂ yearly.

In total, this could lead to up to 126 million tons of CO₂ captured every year by 2030 throughout Europe, with Norway and the UK the two major contributors, single-handedly capturing more carbon by 2030 than the entire EU combined, and the Netherlands and Denmark the largest contributors inside the EU.

Source: IOGP Europe

This is a major progress being made toward net neutrality and should not be too quickly dismissed as insufficient.

However, Europe’s carbon emissions in 2025 were as high as 4.6 billion tons. So even the massive 126 million tons yearly, aimed for 2030, are still just below 3% of total emissions in 2025 for the region.

As Europe is only responsible for <10% of global emissions (but more of cumulative historical emissions), still much larger scale of carbon capture efforts will likely be required post-2030 and into the 2040s and 2050s to limit the global concentration of CO₂.

Investing In Northern Light

Shell

Shell is one of the ”Big Oil” companies that has been the most proactive in embracing lower carbon emissions, and ultimately a post-fossil fuel future and the energy transition. The goal is to manage the transition to becoming a net-zero energy business by 2050.

One key element of this strategy is a greater focus on LNG and pipeline gas, as natural gas is easier to couple with carbon capture and is, in any case, emitting lower levels of CO₂. This was also a logical step for the company responsible for shipping the world’s first commercial LNG cargo from Algeria to the UK 60 years ago.

Biofuels and electricity sales are also expected to contribute a growing part of Shell’s revenues.

Source: Shell

Source: Shell

Northern Lights is a good example of Shell deploying its existing skillsets (geology, drilling, piping, shipping, liquefying gases) into a new domain, with every step of the carbon capture project “recycling” the ability the company has spent decades improving in the oil & gas fields.

Another “new energy” sector the company is investing in is its “Renewables & Energy Solutions” segment, which includes hydrogen and EV charging. This results in a steep reduction of cost for the energy group, with a targeted $5B-$7B structural cost reduction between 2022-2028.

Source: Shell

Despite this shifting priorities, away from oil and later on away from gas, Shell is staying committed to returns to its shareholders and delivering a 4% annual progressive dividend growth. Part of the company’s strategy to deliver this result is a tight financial control, with lower debt levels, driven by reduced investment in finding and starting new oil & gas fields.

Another element of Shell focusing on “safe” returns is a cautious approach to geopolitical risks for its oil & gas assets, with its main assets away from major conflict zones like the Persian Gulf, centered around the US Gulf of Mexico, Nigeria, Malaysia, and Argentina.

So overall, as far as traditional energy stocks go, Shell offers investors a conservative approach envisioning a slow phasing out of fossil fuels, with first pipeline gas & LNG, then renewable and EVs

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