Page 25: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (October 2026)

OFFSHORE CO STORAGE 2 beyond the vessel itself to compres- offshore expertise. Oil and gas com- subsea pipelines, repurposed platforms, sion and liquefaction systems, storage panies bring reservoir models, seismic injection wells, reservoir management, tanks, pumps, loading equipment, data, well inventories, and operating and decades of monitoring.

and terminal infrastructure. systems while contractors contribute Not all CCS spending will move off-

Ports can therefore become carbon drilling, subsea engineering, com- shore, but the direction is clear – as the hubs. CO from multiple capture sites pression, ? ow assurance, and integ- market scales, a growing share of the 2 can be consolidated at coastal terminals rity capabilities. Ports and shipowners commercial opportunity extends beyond for conditioning, temporary storage, connect dispersed capture sites with capture into transport and dependable, and onward transport. Ports serving concentrated offshore storage. permitted storage. For maritime and re? nery, chemical, cement, and power offshore companies, CO is becoming a 2 clusters are natural aggregation points. new cargo, a new subsurface service and

The Main Risk Is the Chain

Porthos illustrates a key CCS risk a new use for aging infrastructure.

When Sharing Becomes – all parts of the system must come

Sources online together. Delays in pipelines,

Good Business 1. Global CCS Institute 2. Northern Lights

This supports a hub-and-cluster compression, wells, capture facilities, 3. Porthos model in which several emitters share or permitting can leave completed as- 4. Greensand Future / INEOS transport and storage infrastructure. sets underused and postpone revenues 5. Eni 6. European Commission across the whole project. This type

For lower-volume sources such as in- 7. International Maritime Organization (IMO) dividual cement plants, a dedicated of integration risk is familiar across 8. bp / Northern Endurance Partnership pipeline and storage system may be many maritime and offshore projects.

9. PETRONAS 10. International Energy Agency (IEA)

However, unlike oil or LNG, captured uneconomic – aggregation can there- 11. China Daily

CO usually has little or no intrinsic sale fore expand the addressable CCS mar- 12. Petrobras 2 value at destination in dedicated-storage ket, not merely reduce unit costs.

Maritime industry players should chains. Revenues instead come from pay attention to the development of transport-and-storage fees, carbon-price terminals aggregating volumes, CO incentives, regulated support, or the 2 carriers connecting dispersed sources, compliance value created for the emit- and storage systems serving multiple ter. CO used for EOR or other appli- 2 customers. Transport and storage can cations can generate additional revenue, become a standalone infrastructure but this is not the core business model for most dedicated storage hubs.

business based on contracted capac-

Storage is also a long-duration service, ity and long-term service agreements.

Northern Lights already follows this with obligations extending from site model, offering third-party emitters characterization through monitoring, across Europe access to an integrated post-injection surveillance, and eventual closure. Because operators recover costs transport-and-storage network. through transport and storage services rather than the sale of a commodity, as-

Policy Is Creating Storage Demand set utilization and contracted through-

The European Union (EU) Net-Ze- ro Industry Act requires developing at put are critical to project economics. least 50 Mtpa of annual CO injection Anchor customers, long-term contracts 2 capacity in the EU by 2030. In May and shared infrastructure therefore be- come central to project ? nance.

2025, the European Commission iden- ti? ed 44 obligated entities expected to

The Next Offshore Market contribute to that target. This shifts the

Carbon sequestration is creating a new

CCS discussion from whether storage capacity should be developed to how infrastructure market rather than simply quickly it can be permitted, ? nanced, adding another piece of equipment to industrial plants. The value chain reach- and connected to emitters.

That raises the strategic value of es from ports and specialized ships to www.marinelink.com 25

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