March 27, 2025
The expansion of Northern Lights will increase the transport and storage capacity from 1.5 million to a minimum of 5 million tonnes of CO2 per year, enabling further reduction and removal of European industrial CO2 emissions. The investment decision to expand capacity follows a commercial agreement with the Swedish energy provider, Stockholm Exergi, for cross-border transport and storage of up to 900,000 tonnes of biogenic CO2 annually.
“The decision to expand our CO2 transport and storage services represents the next step in building a commercially viable CCS market in Europe. It confirms Northern Lights’ commitment to offer an effective solution for companies to reduce emissions. The investment decision is an important milestone for our company, our customers and industry partners, governments, and regulators. We have jointly been working hard to establish the CCS chain and make a real difference enabling Europe to achieve climate targets”, says Tim Heijn, Managing Director of Northern Lights JV.
Commercially based investment
The investment made by the Northern Lights JV owners Equinor, Shell and TotalEnergies is 7.5 billion NOK. This includes the enabling grant of €131 million from the Connecting Europe Facility for Energy (CEF Energy) funding scheme, approved by the European Commission in June 2024.
“The announcement of a positive Final Investment Decision (FID) for the construction works of Northern Lights phase 2 is a very important milestone for this CEF-funded project and a key step forward to make available additional CO2 storage capacity to European emitters”, says Juan de Miguel Salanova, Head of Sector at CEF Energy.
The Norwegian government’s establishment of the full-scale Longship CCS project and the support from the European Commission for a commercial expansion phase has enabled the stepwise Northern Lights development; leveraging the existing onshore and offshore infrastructure in Øygarden, Norway. The new infrastructure will include additional onshore storage tanks, pumps, a new jetty and injection wells, and more CO2 transport vessels. The expansion is expected to be completed and ready for operation in the second half of 2028.
“This is a major step in the further development of a large-scale carbon capture, transportation and storage value chain. The support from the Norwegian Government and European Commission has been important contributing factors to successfully completing phase 1 and advancing phase 2. That we are now able to progress the Northern Lights’ project second phase on a commercial basis, demonstrates the value of public-private partnerships to reduce risk and attract customers”, says Anders Opedal, CEO of Equinor.
“Carbon capture and storage has a role to play in helping society progress towards net-zero emissions. Northern Lights is a great example of what can be achieved when industry works together with governments and customers to unlock the potential of CCS. Proceeding with phase two of Northern Lights is another key milestone when it comes to CCS and helping our customers in hard-to-abate sectors to decarbonise. For Shell, Northern Lights is an important part of our integrated offer to our customers and builds on our decades of experience developing CCS projects around the globe”, says Huibert Vigeveno, Downstream, Renewables and Energy Solutions Director at Shell.
“I am delighted of the launch of Northern Lights phase 2, which represents a significant step forward for the CCS industry. Northern Lights can thus provide a concrete solution for the hard-to-abate industrial emitters in Europe, so that they can reduce their CO2 emissions and thereby secure their businesses’ sustainability”, says Nicolas Terraz, President Exploration & Production of TotalEnergies.
Cross-border transport and storage agreement with Stockholm Exergi
In relation to the expansion investment decision, Northern Lights today announces the signing of a commercial cross-border transport and storage agreement with the Swedish district energy provider Stockholm Exergi to store up to 900,000 tonnes biogenic CO2 emissions per year for 15 years starting from 2028 as part of the large-scale Bio-Energy Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) project. Stockholm Exergi’s goal is to create a world-class, full-scale BECCS facility at their existing heat and power biomass plant in the heart of Stockholm.
“I am very pleased that Northern Lights has decided to move forward with its project. This is a crucial step in our collaboration. Permanent carbon storage will play a key role in achieving the climate targets. Together, we are laying the foundation for what could become an entirely new industry – one with the potential to make the Nordics and Europe global leaders in this field,” says Anders Egelrud, CEO of Stockholm Exergi.
Northern Lights ready to start operations in 2025
The first phase development of Northern Lights is completed and ready to receive CO2 from Norwegian and European industrial emitters. Operations are scheduled to start this summer, with the first CO2 transport and storage from Heidelberg Materials’ cement factory in Brevik, as part of the Longship project by the Norwegian government.
“We are looking forward to start-up the first CO2 transport and storage operations this summer. And we are excited to continue building additional capacity following the positive investment decision for the second phase”, says Tim Heijn.
Media contacts:Northern Lights JV: Morten Eek, Senior Communication Adviser, +47 416 89 515 [email protected]
Stockholm Exergi: Fredrik Persson, Press Chief, +46 730 63 8171 [email protected]
About Northern LightsNorthern Lights offers CO2 transport and storage as a service. Our mission is to enable the reduction and removal of industrial emissions in Europe.
Liquefied CO2 from capture sites is shipped to an onshore receiving terminal in western Norway, before transported by pipeline for permanent storage in a reservoir 2,600 meters under the seabed.
Ready to receive CO2 from 2024, Northern Lights is the first company to offer commercial CCS services.
The first phase of Northern Lights is part of Longship, the Norwegian Government’s full-scale carbon capture and storage project.
Northern Lights will transport and store CO2 from two Norwegian industries; Heidelberg Materials’ cement factory in Brevik and the Hafslund Celsio’ waste-to-energy plant in Oslo.
Stockholm Exergi is the third European company to sign a commercial CO2 transport and storage agreement with Northern Lights, following earlier agreements with Yara in the Netherlands and Ørsted in Denmark.
Northern Lights JV DA is a registered, incorporated General Partnership with Shared Liability (DA) owned by Equinor, TotalEnergies and Shell.
About Stockholm ExergiAs Sweden’s leading district heating company, Stockholm Exergi is a pioneer in sustainable and circular solutions for heating, electricity, and cooling in Stockholm.
With a long history of developing innovative solutions, Stockholm Exergi is now working to become the largest provider of permanent negative emissions in the EU.
Stockholm Exergi is owned by the City of Stockholm and a consortium of leading European pension funds (APG, Alecta, PGGM, Keva, and AXA).