A recent S&P Global Energy report raises an important question for the next phase of carbon management.
The global CCUS pipeline now exceeds 1,000 million tonnes per annum, yet S&P Global estimates that only around 25% of reported 2030 capacity is likely to come online on schedule under its risk-adjusted methodology.
Horizons Clean Energy Expansion Week 2026 – CCUS Report.pdf
One of the emerging differentiators is infrastructure.
Shared CO₂ transport and storage hubs are increasingly helping projects reach sanction, while projects without access to such infrastructure face greater execution risk.
Horizons Clean Energy Expansion Week 2026 – CCUS Report.pdf
At the same time, another major change is occurring.
S&P Global identifies rapidly growing data-centre electricity demand as a new use case for reliable gas-fired generation combined with carbon capture, estimating that data centres could account for approximately 10% of incremental global power demand by 2030.
Horizons Clean Energy Expansion Week 2026 – CCUS Report.pdf
This raises a broader engineering question:
If we capture CO₂ from firm power generation, must we always transport and permanently store it?
Or, where renewable hydrogen is available, can some captured CO₂ instead become a carbon resource—converted back into a fuel, used for firm power generation, captured again and recycled?
The distinction is important.
CCS: Capture → Transport → Storage
Carbon Recycling: Capture → Conversion with renewable H₂ → Reuse → Capture again
Carbon recycling does not eliminate the energy requirement. Renewable hydrogen must provide the energy required to regenerate the fuel, and the complete mass and energy balance must be economically justified.
But where CO₂ transport and geological storage are difficult, and where firm power, heat, cooling and carbon management are required together, carbon recycling deserves serious consideration alongside conventional CCS.
Perhaps the next stage of carbon management is not simply asking:
“How much CO₂ can we capture?”
but also:
“What should we do with the carbon after we capture it?”
Carbon is an element. Its sustainability depends on how we manage its cycle.
#CarbonCapture #CCUS #CarbonRecycling #Hydrogen #DataCentres #FirmPower #CircularEconomy #EnergyTransition #PowerToX #Sustainability
