Corporate heavyweights back Japan’s CCS push

Inpex and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries among participants in seven large-scale projects as government sets ambitious expansion targets

Japan is turning to some of its biggest energy and industrial companies to spearhead development of nascent CCS technologies that Tokyo hopes will help the world’s fifth-largest carbon emitter reach net zero by 2050. Tokyo believes CCS could play a significant role in decarbonising Japan—particularly in the power and industry sectors, which generated 646mt of CO₂, or 62.5% of total emissions, in 2021, according to the National Institute for Environmental Studies. Japan’s Long-Term CCS Roadmap, released this summer, calls for developing enough CCS capacity to store up to 6–12mt/yr of CO₂ by 2030 and as much as 120–240mt/yr by 2050. The near-term target for the end of this decade is ambitious