The UK Oil and Gas Industry's Advocacy on Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)

Executive Summary

• New analysis from InfluenceMap suggests that for more than 15 years, the oil and gas industry has systematically pushed the UK government to adopt a costly, emissions-intensive energy policy agenda dependent on carbon capture and storage (CCS) and the continued reliance on fossil fuels. Strategic advocacy in favour of CCS comes predominantly from large oil and gas producers Shell, BP, Eni, Equinor, and ExxonMobil, along with the UK-based Carbon Capture and Storage Association (CCSA), a cross-sector group disproportionately representing oil and gas majors that has engaged consistently with the UK government since 2008.
• Despite 15 years of oil and gas industry promoting CCS to the government, CCS development has proven to be costly and uncertain, especially for power generation. As of September 2025, no CCS projects are operational in the UK. In the past, companies have cancelled several CCS projects following the withdrawal of government subsidies. Many of the industry’s cost-related promises about the technology have not materialized: recent government statistics show that gas generation even without CCS remains costly at ~£114/MWh, defying industry’s 2013 prediction of gas with CCS falling to “below £100/MWh by 2025.” However, the UK government remains committed to subsidizing CCS, recently announcing significant investments in fossil fuel-related CCS projects.
• Oil and gas interests are the most active advocates for CCS in the UK, deploying a range of tactics from written submissions to participation in public-private forums and recording more CCS-related meetings with government than any other sector. In contrast, this analysis finds limited engagement from industries such as cement and steel where CCS is a critical mitigation option, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). These findings are consistent with previous InfluenceMap analyses that identified oil and gas sector efforts to frame CCS as a silver bullet solution globally.¹
• Oil and gas advocacy on CCS in the UK uses narratives that appear to contradict science-based guidance from the IPCC. Oil and gas interests regularly exaggerate the scope, scale, and climate contribution of CCS, promoting the technology for sectors that could be more effectively decarbonized by cleaner and more affordable alternatives. Using CCS to justify expansion of fossil fuel production, for example, or promoting CCS adoption in heating and oil refineries—where alternative pathways to decarbonizing exist—are common industry arguments that do not align with the latest scientific guidance.
• Despite promoting the benefits of CCS in public-facing communications and campaigns, the oil and gas industry is more sceptical about its effectiveness in private communications with governments globally. Oil and gas companies tend to question the feasibility of CCS when facing binding regulations to deploy the technology, a trend evident in the UK in the 2010s and in North America and the EU more recently. ExxonMobil, for example, claimed in the US in 2023 that long-term CO2 storage is “simply unproven” and in 2024 noted the “speculative nature of CCS and hydrogen.” Similarly, CCSA claimed that the EU’s carbon storage target was “unrealistic” in an April 2025 consultation, while Shell stated that the EU’s timelines for carbon storage are “highly challenging.” Such scepticism suggests a wider oil and gas strategy to lock in a policy model based primarily on incentives and subsidies without regulatory accountability or science-based emission reductions.
• The UK’s plans to develop CCS in the power sector could lock in fossil fuels and divert policy attention from renewable and storage technologies that are rapidly falling in cost. CCS for power generation is among the costliest mitigation options for the energy sector, according to the IPCC. Over half of the proposed gas CCS projects in the UK involve developing new gas plants, likely raising reliance on gas imports and adding significant emissions even if the industry meets the promised minimum 90% capture rate. Six new gas projects proposed by the industry could emit 2.4–5 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MtCO2eq) annually—the same as adding 1.3–2.6 million petrol cars a year in the UK. The emissions from these projects could be more than three times higher if the gas is supplied as liquified natural gas (LNG) from the US Permian Basin, considering methane’s 20-year global warming potential. (see Appendix).

¹ InfluenceMap, ‘The Canadian Oil Sands Playbook: An Analysis of Pathways Alliance (June 2024) and ‘Corporate Advocacy on Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) How the Oil and Gas Sector is Influencing the Global Agenda on CCS and Fossil Fuel Phase-out’ (December 2023).