Local opposition mounts to carbon capture projects in Louisiana

by Natalie McLendon, Louisiana Illuminator
February 26, 2025

OBERLIN — Concerns about the risks of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) projects were the main focus of a community meeting Monday night in Allen Parish. 

We the People, a grassroots movement of Allen Parish community members, hosted the three-hour meeting. The event brought concerned residents and legislators together as panelists spoke to a packed audience at the Allen Parish Civic Center about the safety of storing carbon dioxide underground near the Chicot Aquifer, which provides nearly half of the state’s drinking water. 

Members of Louisiana CO2 Alliance, a multi-parish coalition with reservations about carbon sequestration, also spoke at the meeting. 

“We don’t want eminent domain on these CO2 pipelines. Nor do we want this poison potentially falling into our water,” Roland Hollins, an Allen Parish Police Jury member and Alliance representative, told the Illuminator​.

Dr. Cade Burns, local family physician, talked about the potential health effects of carbon dioxide exposure from CCS projects during a failure or leak. Increasing concentrations of CO2 affects the body with headaches, nausea and confusion at lower levels, while prolonged exposure could lead to anoxic brain injury or death, the doctor said.

“My concern [is] with my local community, my patients, my family. I think that this is something that we all need to really think hard,” Burns said. “Do we want this in our parish? Do we want this in our community?” 

Two companies have proposed CO2 storage sites under the Chicot Aquifer. 

ExxonMobil has designated the specific locations of its proposed CO2 injection wells in Louisiana as trade secrets, a move allowed under state law. However, the location of wells used for testing injection pressures is publicly available information. According to the Louisiana Department of Energy and Natural Resources (DENR), ExxonMobil is awaiting permits for its two test wells – Mockingbird IZM and Hummingbird IZM. 

Occidental Petroleum Corp. subsidiary 1PointFive has one permitted test well in Allen Parish. Its Magnolia Sequestration Hub project is funded by a U.S. Department of Energy grant.

According to DENR documents, there are currently 58 Class VI injection well applications across 18 parishes in Louisiana. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is expected to give the state authority to approve Class VI permits later this year, which would allow the injection of carbon dioxide underground.

Frances Cannon, a We the People committee member, told the Illuminator the group’s main concern was the risk carbon sequestration poses to Louisiana’s water supply. 

“We’ve actually got three water aquifers here. We’ve got the Chicot, the Evangeline and the Jasper … It’s not just Allen Parish we’re worried about, it’s all the surrounding parishes.”

In 2024, the Allen Parish Police Jury commissioned McNeese State University and Gulf Engineers and Consultants of Baton Rouge to conduct a risk-benefit analysis of carbon capture and sequestration, according to The American Press.

“The main pipeline from Denbury, which was purchased last year by Exxon, runs about two-tenths of a mile from my house,” Cannon said. “… It’s unbelievable how terribly their pipelines are maintained, so the transport of the CO2 is another issue.”

Earlier this month, a federal regulatory agency fined Denbury $2.4 million for harassing inspectors who were reviewing the company’s work on its CO2 pipeline in Sartaria, Mississippi. The project is meant to replace a pipeline that exploded in 2020, sending 45 people to the hospital. 

Renee Savant, who manages the Louisiana CO2 Alliance, said it will release a step-by-step guide next month to help residents share their feedback on CCS projects with state legislators. She stressed the importance of telling personal stories.

“In this legislative session of 2025, this battle that we’re fighting right now, it’s going to be won or lost, and it’s every one of us who needs to come together,” Savant said.

During the meeting, legislators discussed a new bill that could give local governments more control over CCS well permits. Prefiled in February by Rep. Charles Owen, R-Rosepine. Reps Beryl Amedée, R-Shreveport, Dodie Horton, R-Haughton, and Rodney Schamerhorn, R-Hornbeck, have signed on as cosponsors. The Louisiana Legislature begins this year’s lawmaking session April 14.

“I wish right now that the police jury in Allen or Vernon or Beauregard could just say, ‘We’re not issuing that permit,’ but because of the way our law is established, they can’t,” Owen told the audience. “So what my legislation is going to do is give them that authority.”

The proposed bill would allow parishes to regulate carbon sequestration projects by directly approving or rejecting them. If officials approve a project against public sentiment, residents could petition for a referendum, requiring 15% of registered voters in the parish to sign a petition to put the question on the ballot.

“If I were king for a day and had three more wishes, I would make carbon sequestration an illegal activity,” Owen said, prompting applause. “Carbon sequestration is creating a waste site. Yeah, this is creating a dump, and it is a dangerous dump.”

Owen acknowledged voting for pro-carbon capture legislation in 2020.

“There was a vote in 2020 … every one of us voted for it. They came in and all we were told was, ‘Hey, we’re going to expand this thing called carbon capture, and it’s going to help the oil and gas industry …’ I had no idea it was poison. I wish I had that vote back.”

Owen did vote for a proposal in 2023 that would have placed a moratorium on CCS projects in Lake Maurepas, where Air Products wants to store carbon piped in from its facilities in  Ascension Parish. The bill failed to win approval in the state house.

Hollis called Owen’s bill an opportunity to fight back. 

“We’re up against a giant,” he said. “But where we had no chance, now we do. More landowners and communities are starting to wake up, and sooner or later, those numbers matter.”​

“There’s no value to injecting CO2 under our water – only risks,” Hollis added.​

Under Louisiana law, parishes receive 30% of revenue from CCS projects on state-owned land. Allen Parish won’t get any share from its largest proposed site at West Bay Wildlife Management Area near Oakdale because timber companies own the land. 

Local governments have limited authority to halt CCS projects, and a proposal last year to allow parishes to tax the sites didn’t even get a committee vote. 

The Louisiana CO2 Alliance plans to lobby during the legislative session for new policies, mandatory community alerts, first responder training and removing the $10 million liability cap for CCS companies if they are responsible for an accident at their site.

The next community meeting on carbon capture and sequestration in southwest Louisiana will take place in Jefferson Davis Parish on at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Lacassine Community Center.

Correction: This report was updated to correct names.

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