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Carbon capture and storage: legal issues

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M.J. Mace
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This opinion piece explores a host of legal and regulatory issues and concerns related to increasing carbon dioxide capture and storage (CCS) technologies as a climate change mitigation strategy.The report highlights the following challenges: international conventions and regional agreements currently prohibit some proposed forms of geological storageboth developed and developing countries lack regulatory frameworks for geological storageinternational standards for site selection, monitoring, and accounting are neededdeveloping countries may additionally lack regulatory frameworks for capture and transport, including environmental, health and safety regulationslegal frameworks have not yet been developed to address long-term liability issues for stored CO2, or for the impacts of leakage from geological storage sites to the global atmosphereThe paper concludes that existing legal frameworks may preclude certain CCS activities or cast doubt on their legality. Efforts are underway to clarify the applicability of individual regimes to CCS activities (e.g., under the London Protocol). However, much remains to be done to create a clear regulatory framework for CCS.