Northern Lights JV has achieved a key milestone, injecting the first volumes of carbon dioxide into its offshore storage site in the Norwegian North Sea.
The CO₂ was transported through a 100-km pipeline and injected into the Aurora reservoir, 2,600 m below the seabed. “Our ships, facilities and wells are now in operation,” said managing director Tim Heijn.
Northern Lights is the first commercial CO₂ transport and storage provider. Its phase one facilities are part of Longship, the Norwegian government’s full-scale CCS initiative. Early customers include Heidelberg Materials’ cement plant in Brevik and Hafslund Celsio’s waste-to-energy plant in Oslo, alongside commercial agreements with Yara in the Netherlands, Ørsted in Denmark and Stockholm Exergi in Sweden.
The joint venture between Equinor, TotalEnergies and Shell will continue transporting and storing CO₂ from Norwegian sources for the rest of 2025, with volumes from Denmark and the Netherlands expected to follow in 2026.
In March, the jv took final investment decision on an expansion that will raise capacity from 1.5m tonnes per year to at least 5m tonnes per year. Backed by Connecting Europe Facility for Energy (CEF Energy) funding, the project will add onshore storage tanks, pumps, a new jetty, more injection wells and additional CO₂ carriers.
