Analysis of a prominent carbon storage project failure – The role of the national government as initiator and decision maker in the Barendrecht case

• We analysed the unsuccessful Barendrecht CO2 storage project.
• Previous studies focussed on the local opposition as a key factor in CCS projects.
• We show that national policy is also an important explanatory variable.
• At the national level, first CCS and then the implementation of the project were contested.
• This disagreement resulted in the cancellation of the project.

CO2 capture and storage (CCS) represents an important option to mitigate climate change. However, the implementation of CCS is slow. We analysed one of the unsuccessful projects in the Netherlands that is referred to as the Barendrecht CO2 storage project, with an emphasis on the role of the national government. We performed an event analysis based on debates in the Dutch Parliament, interviews with the relevant stakeholders and published literature. We show that the opinion of the national government regarding this project changed over time. Consensus on the necessity of CCS was assumed at the start of the project. However, over time, the local opposition intensified, and both CCS as a climate mitigation strategy and its implementation, including its location, were contested. An important contributor was the lack of solid outside support, whereas the views of opponents were strongly represented. Additionally, due to multiple delays, the momentum was lost, which ended the enthusiasm of initial supporters. To ensure implementation of future CCS projects, overall national support should therefore be guaranteed prior to the start of the project.