Your public money is being used to pay oil companies to capture carbon dioxide, which they use to pump more oil out of the ground, releasing more CO2 into the air, making the climate emergency worse

Ted Schettler, MD, and Sandra Steingraber, PhD, continue the discussion of carbon dioxide (CO2) being used to extract more oil out of depleted oil fields.

There are 14 U.S. carbon capture projects that are using their CO2 to pump more oil out of the ground, making climate change worse, not better.

This article from Nature Climate Change shows that carbon dioxide “use” could never amount to more than a few percent of what’s needed to avoid climate catastrophe. Cheaper, cleaner alternatives already exist off-the-shelf. CO2 “use” is a smoke screen to benefit the fossil fuel industry and no one else.

In this tongue-in-cheek graphic, University of Iowa Research Engineer Chris Jones depicts the main use of CCS in Iowa as enhanced oil recovery, leading to ecosystem degradation and a few super-rich individuals (and legislators) getting more piles of money.

Jim Wash, Policy Director of Food & Water Watch, discusses carbon capture and hydrogen.

“Blue Hydrogen” is hydrogen gas made from fossil gas (aka “natural gas”) with CCS used to hide the CO2 emissions. But producing fossil gas harms the climate and public health. Blue hydrogen is another bad idea dreamed up by Big Oil to keep selling product.