Climate groups, unions push Congress for carbon capture funding in infrastructure bills

A coalition of groups sent a letter to House and Senate leaders Tuesday morning calling for the infrastructure bills moving through Congress to bolster nascent carbon capture and storage ventures.

Why it matters: This may be the broadest coalition yet put together to advocate for carbon capture and storage policies (CCS).

• The letter is backed by major unions, including United Steelworkers and the AFL-CIO, along with big corporations like United Airlines, Equinor and Shell.
• In addition, the environmental groups Nature Conservancy, National Wildlife Federation and Clean Air Task Force are also signatories.

Details: In the letter, the groups call for changes to tax credits for CCS projects as well as direct funding of commercial-scale pilot projects and carbon storage pipelines and facilities.

• The changes to tax credits endorsed in the letter are not yet in the infrastructure bill as unveiled Monday, according to Brad Crabtree, director of the Carbon Capture Coalition.
• It also backs direct air capture technologies, which, currently at early stages of research, are a potential tool to help the U.S. get to net-negative emissions by the second half of the century.
• "Carbon capture technologies have suffered a significant lack of federal investment compared to historic levels of support for other clean energy technologies," the letter states.