Louisiana Tops the U.S. in Carbon Storage. Corporations Got Eminent Domain to Do It.

Louisiana Leads the Nation in Carbon Storage. Citizens Are Paying the Price.

Louisiana has more planned carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) projects than any other state in the country. The Environmental Integrity Project mapped and cataloged the expansion in a report released this year, finding Louisiana at the center of an industry that relies on state-granted powers and federal subsidies rather than a functioning market.

CCS involves capturing industrial carbon dioxide emissions and injecting them underground for permanent storage. Supporters frame it as climate infrastructure. Critics, including landowners and geologists who have reviewed the permits and regulatory filings, say it is industrial waste disposal conducted on terms set entirely by the corporations doing the burying.

“The question before Louisiana is not whether farmers deserve opportunities. It’s whether citizens should surrender their property rights, public resources and local control so multinational corporations can bury millions of tons of industrial waste beneath our communities.”

Louisiana landowner and commentary author, Louisiana Illuminator, June 12, 2026

The legal architecture behind CCS in Louisiana is worth examining on its own. State law grants private CCS corporations the power to expropriate private land through eminent domain. Those same corporations receive liability immunity protections that cap their exposure if something goes wrong. Federal 45Q tax credits, which the Treasury Department has allocated at a rate of billions of dollars annually, cover a cost structure that would otherwise make most of these projects non-viable.

The Pro-CCS Narrative Has a Coordinated Shape

A June 9, 2026 piece in the Louisiana Illuminator, submitted by Chad Hanks, offered a first-person account of a farmer who found CCS fears “unwarranted.” That framing, critics say, follows a template: a sympathetic rural voice, economic opportunity as the hook, and opposition recast as misinformation.

The same critics who challenge that framing are not anonymous social media users. They include attorneys, engineers, elected officials, and landowners who have reviewed the actual permit filings and legislative history. Their objection is not to CO2 as a compound. It is to the transfer of risk, property rights, and permanent subsurface access from Louisiana citizens to companies whose liability is capped by statute.

CO2 pipelines are not comparable to oil and gas pipelines, despite the frequent analogy. Oil and gas pipelines move a product someone is buying. CCS pipelines move a waste stream to a disposal site. The liability structure, the eminent domain powers, and the federal subsidy dependence all reflect that distinction.

What You Can Do Now

1. Call your Louisiana state legislators at the Louisiana Legislature’s main switchboard at (225) 342-6945 and ask them to repeal or amend the CCS eminent domain statute. Tell them you oppose any law that lets a private corporation take your land for waste disposal without your consent.

2. Contact Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry’s office at (225) 342-7015 and ask him to require full public hearings before any new CCS injection well permits are approved by the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources.

3. Submit a public comment to the Louisiana Office of Conservation, which oversees Class VI injection well permits. Comment windows open when new permits are filed. Find active dockets and filing instructions at the Louisiana DNR Office of Conservation site.

4. Contact your U.S. House member through the Capitol switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask them to support a cap or means-test on the federal 45Q tax credit so that CCS subsidies do not continue flowing to projects that cannot survive without them.

Sources

• Beware the coordinated effort to manufacture carbon storage acceptance — Louisiana Illuminator (2026-06-12)

• Louisiana Illuminator: Coordinated Effort to Manufacture Carbon Storage Acceptance

• Louisiana Illuminator: Farmer Finds Fears Over Carbon Capture Unwarranted

• Environmental Integrity Project: Carbon Capture and Sequestration Expansion in Louisiana

• U.S. Treasury: 45Q Carbon Oxide Sequestration Tax Credit Overview

• Louisiana DNR Office of Conservation: Class VI Injection Well Permits

[Quote: “The question before Louisiana is not whether farmers deserve opportunities.

It’s whether citizens should surrender their property rights, public resources and local control so multinational corporations can bury millions of tons of industrial waste beneath our communities.”, Louisiana landowner, commentary author. Louisiana Illuminator, June 12, 2026]