In the hecticness of the budget season, Pennsylvania passed a law to allow and regulate carbon capture & storage technology.

Carbon capture technology is the attempt to capture carbon during energy production—like with coal or other fossil fuels.

“It’s this idea that you can take the carbon dioxide, you can put it underground and keep it there. And by doing that, you can start reducing emissions and sort of canceling out emissions,” said Karen Feridun, co founder of the environmental advocacy group Better Path Coalition. 

The technology remains in the research stage, and has links to hydrogen hub development. According to Senator Gene Yaw, the U.S. Department of Energy awarded over $1 billion dollars to programs in other states this year.

“When I see that Texas and California and Montana are getting all these grants to study things… we can study them too,” said Yaw. "Pennsylvania can benefit from those funds just like everybody else.”

SB 831, sponsored by Yaw and signed into law in July, established policy and regulation for carbon capture efforts.

“I think that we now have the structure where we can say we can go to the Feds with the applications and say, we're set up to study this,” said Yaw.

The law was controversial as it went through the legislature; both Democrats and Republicans voted against the bill in the Senate (37-12) and House (127- 75).

Some environmental groups oppose the law and plan to appeal in court.

Better Path Coalition said the technology was inspired decades ago by a process that would capture carbon then release it into oil wells that were mostly empty. The carbon would work to loose any excess oil to be brought out. It has been more recent years that research shifted to an emissions solution.

Feridun said no prior research projects have succeeded in high carbon capture rates. She also noted the technology remains too expensive to operate without federal subsidies.

“Nothing has worked to date. Lots of people consider it unproven, but there are those who call it disproven,” said Feridun.

There are also concerns about property rights. Companies would have to buy sub terrain space from property owners where they would store the carbon. The law has a stipulation that if 75% of the land owners in the area agree to sell, the rest are folded into a sale whether they approve or not.

Sen. Yaw spoke on the provision, saying the storage would average around 2 miles below ground.

Feridun with Better Path raised concerns that there is little known about what happens to the carbon after it is stored.

For Yaw, he maintains that it is better to be proactive— pointing to uncertainty around solar panel disposal that he says could have been averted if lawmakers made a plan years prior, as an example of what happens when lawmakers are not proactive.

“First thing is, if somebody comes and spends $3-400 million dollars, fine— that money comes into Pennsylvania,” said Yaw. “The long term, if it produces beneficial results for either storage or long term jobs or anything like that, that’s a benefit to Pennsylvania."