Exxon Mobil Corp is pursuing carbon capture storage (CCS) hubs across Asia and has started talks with some countries with potential storage options for carbon dioxide. One of Exxon’s key projects is to build CCS hubs in Southeast Asia, like one being built in Houston, Texas. CCS traps emissions and buries them underground but is not yet at the commercialization stage. CCS advocates, including oil majors and the International Energy Agency, see the technology as being essential to help meet net zero emissions and key to unlocking large-scale economic hydrogen production, although critics say CCS will extend the life of dirty fossil fuels.
ExxonMobil estimated nearly 300 billion tonnes of CO2 storage capacity in depleted oil and gas fields and saline formations in Southeast Asia. Countries in the region with potential storage sites include Indonesia, Malaysia, and Australia where ExxonMobil has oil and gas production facilities. The U.S. major also operates a joint refining-petrochemical complex in eastern China Fujian with Sinopec and Saudi Aramco. The market for CO2 is rather limited when you put it into that scale, and therefore storage of CO2 long term is essential.