U.S. CCS stakeholders must overcome serious trust deficits to meet net-zero potential, new research shows

Worley, a global professional services company of energy, chemicals and resources experts, and researchers at Princeton University’s Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, have identified that a lack of trust between project stakeholders is slowing the pace of infrastructure delivery that is critical to net-zero.

The finding comes from primary research carried out for the 4^th Ed. of the “From Ambition to Reality” paper series: Net zero at the speed of trust. 

New research included in the paper, which saw hundreds of infrastructure professionals and thousands of broader stakeholders and members of the public surveyed, points to a lack of trust in the U.S. carbon capture and storage (CCS) industry. It has found that public trust in CCS projects is lower than perceived by industry professionals.

This public trust perception mismatch is compounded by challenges within industry. The research found that within the CCS professionals group, 64% are generally skeptical about the information provided by other CCS companies working on the same CCS project. Additionally, 59% of professionals express skepticism towards information from regulators, and 57% towards information from environmental organizations in relation to CCS projects.

Discussing the findings, Sue Brown, Executive Group Director, Sustainability & Corporate Affairs at Worley, said, “We are strong CCS advocates, but this research indicates that unless participants build durable trust with each other, its potential to deliver a critical means of cutting carbon emissions in the U.S. will be more precarious. And this challenge reaches beyond CCS.

“While trust between all infrastructure participants is important, the relationships between asset developers, governments, financiers and civil society are considered by experts to have the most impact on the pace at which projects can be delivered. These groups, in particular, must invest time and effort to build durable trust through sharing information, collaborating, and creating shared value.”

“Net zero infrastructure projects need to be delivered differently. Building durable trust is imperative to speed up project final investment decisions (FID) and delivery in ways that create positive net outcomes for stakeholders. If we do not accelerate a paradigm shift in approach, we will simply fail to build the infrastructure of climate response in time. Indeed, we may not even get halfway,” she said.

Chris Greig, Senior Research Scientist at the Andlinger Center for Energy & the Environment at Princeton University, and co-author of the “From Ambition to Reality” series, added: “According to the findings shared in our paper, acceptance for proposed CCS projects and sites can be increased by timely dissemination of information, which was shown to decrease perceived risks, and increase perceived benefits. We think this further implies that early, authentic engagement with host communities and other stakeholders will help underpin the trust needed to accelerate deployment. Given that there are no plausible pathways to net zero that do not involve large scale deployment of CCS technology, building durable trust between infrastructure participants is essential.”

Princeton University and Worley will continue their research partnership, exploring the conditions for durable trust between infrastructure participants. They aim to create a framework through which infrastructure participants can enhance project delivery to achieve the speed and scale of deployment implied by mid-century net-zero goals.

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