European investment atlas of potential CO2 storage sites

The project is expected to produce a digital atlas of ‘investable’ underground storage space for CO₂ in the EU and Associated Countries. The European CO₂ Storage Atlas[[ European CO2 storage database - European Commission (europa.eu)]] currently under revision and being updated by the GSEU project[[ GSEU (geologicalservice.eu)]], including estimated capacity and storage readiness level, presents a good basis, but also shows that data gaps need to be closed, and access to the necessary data during project implementation will be crucial. The Commission's Energy and Industry Geography Lab[[ Energy and Industry Geography Lab - European Commission (europa.eu)]] can also be used. Proposals are expected to include the following:

• Identify and assess with a harmonised methodology, injection and storage capacities for current and planned projects and compare with storage requirements;
• Identify key regions for future pre-licence appraisal (high estimated capacity, proximity to emitters, transport corridors), and develop plans for pre-licence appraisal, per region;
• Each potential storage site must be labelled according to its ‘storage readiness level’ in line with the storage readiness levels included in the GSEU atlas, and matched with public data to speed up the work to identify and assess the storage capacities and what is needed to mature understanding of the site. Furthermore, the identified potential storage sites should be compared and ranked by applying a common ranking scheme developed based on currently used ranking schemes and including a techno-economic assessment;
• Environmental and security aspects must be taken into account.

The proposal is expected to explicitly demonstrate the capacity to have access to the necessary data during the implementation of the grant. Cooperation with relevant national and/or regional actors in the management of the subsurface, such as geological surveys or competent authorities, will be key.