On 26 September the Norwegian Minister of Energy conducts the official opening of the Northern Lights CO2 transport and storage facility in Øygarden, near Bergen. The Northern Lights facility is a joint venture between Equinor, Shell and TotalEnergies, according to Equinor's release.
Large scale carbon capture, transport and storage (CCS) will play a key role in the energy transition as it offers a solution for large and hard-to-abate industrial emitters that need to decarbonise their processes.
The Northern Lights project is part of the Norwegian full-scale CCS project named Longship. The full-scale project includes capture of CO2 from industrial sources and shipping of liquid CO2 to the terminal in Øygarden. From there, the liquified CO2 will be transported by pipeline to the offshore storage location below the seabed in the North Sea, for safe and permanent storage.
The first phase capacity of 1.5 million tons of CO2 per year is fully booked, and the joint venture owners continue to work on plans to increase the transport and storage capacity for the future.
Northern Lights JV is a registered, incorporated General Partnership with Shared Liability (DA), equally owned by Equinor, TotalEnergies and Shell. The Northern Lights facility consists of a receiving terminal, injection pipeline and subsea installations. The Northern Lights project created ripple effects in 2023 of 1.7 bn NOK in deliveries, over 900 man-years and 1.3 bn NOK in value creation.