New draft law on geological storage of carbon to mitigate climate change

Lto Minister of environment and Rural and Marine Affairs, Elena Espinosa, presented the preliminary draft law on geological storage of carbon dioxide, in order to incorporate the Spanish legal system the provisions contained in the European directive 2009/31/ECadapting them to the country's energy, geological and industrial reality. Thus provides a legal basis which ensures safe for the environment and contributes to the fight against climate change. The text of the draft of the future act is limited to regulate the activity of geological storage of carbon dioxide, and only provides for specific provisions in relation to the capture and transport. On the first, the facilities dedicated to this activity are subject to the rules on integrated pollution control. With regard to the second, the transmission pipeline networks shall submit to the environmental impact statement.

Measures to reduce emissions include the capture and geological storage of carbon dioxide, in line with the statements made by the panel of experts on climate change IPCC. In its third assessment report, the panel called for a combination of technological options for mitigation to achieve the necessary reductions and, in particular, that the capture and storage of carbon (ACC) would be an appropriate option for countries with a significant number of sources of CO₂ that need to meet their objectives of development in an environment in which carbon is restricted. Spain is one of them, so the use of the ACC could contribute to the achievement of its objectives in the field of climate change.

The European Union has opted for the capture and geological storage of carbon as a technology of transition which will contribute to mitigating climate change. This technology is to capture the carbon dioxide emitted by industrial facilities for transporting, inject and store, on a permanent basis, in an underground geological formation.