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At a time when the world is collectively combating climate challenges, India’s commitment towards adapting new technology to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions is critical. In her Budget speech for 2026–2027, the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said, “Aligning with the roadmap launched in December 2025, Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage (CCUS) technologies at scale will achieve higher readiness levels in end-use applications across five industrial sectors, including, power, steel, cement, refineries and chemicals. An outlay of ₹20,000 crore is proposed over the next 5 years.”
In its drive towards emission cut, India is engaging in a decarbonisation approach across all its sectors, in line with Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategy (LT-LEDS) framework, under the Paris Agreement. The fresh rationale to invest in CCUS is compelling. Nonetheless, it’s significant to look into the technological prudence and coherence in addressing emissions – which the states must capitalize for green sustainability.
India’s emission trends
India is the world’s third largest CO2 emitter globally, after China and the USA. The undisguised dilemma is that the nation is beset with what is popularly known as the 70 percent emission challenge ahead of its 2070 net-zero optimism. Industry and power sectors jointly contribute to this plight. Studies by NITI Aayog reveal that the share of India’s power sector accounts for only 1/3rd of the aggregate CO2 emissions, while the rest is driven by unabated industries. The prospect of mitigating emissions in the former is relatively viable owing to transitioning towards green energy, while the latter is becoming a hard nut to crack until mechanisms to slacken carbon emissions are in the fray. Of the total emissions, the agriculture and transport sectors also take a prominent share of 20 and 10 percent respectively.
The CCUS is essentially envisaged to be employed in sectors where emissions are hard to be abated. India’s power grid is 70 percent dependent on coal for electricity generation, so this sector emitted approximately 1,600Mt CO2 per year in 2020. In steelmaking, greenhouse gas emissions are currently up to 12 percent of the national average. Cement production is another hard-to electrify industrial sector which emitted CO2 to a tune of 6 percent between 2022 and the following year. Besides these, industries where the scope for CCUS is bright are refineries, chemical and fertilizer producers and the gasification sector, as these industries together emitted 118.5 million tonnes (MtCO2), according to India’s fourth biennial update report to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Road map for India
The Economic Survey 2025-26 endorses that India has grown sustainably with per capita carbon emissions considerably lower than the global average. Yet climate change poses risks to livelihoods, infrastructure, and economic stability. In these circumstances, CCUS is an optimal choice against greenhouse emissions. Any environmental initiative’s success relies on the government’s regulations persuading positive externalities. A favourable policy framework can immensely reduce the burden of investment risks among stakeholders and long-term stability. Also, India must prudently start with industries where pure CO2 is produced, as this becomes cheaper to capture. The scaling up of CCUS must be incremental from its inception.
Globally, the Sleipner CO2 Storage project in Norway is widely regarded as the most successful in its segment, under the influence of the carbon tax policy. The project has carried out advanced monitoring for two decades and has achieved remarkable milestones in its objectives. India must replicate Norwegian initiatives that provide government funding and risk support, preferring clusters to individuals, ensuring transparency in real-time data sharing and other relative factors. India must look at this as a regulated climate tool that requires collective action rather than as an industrial commitment in development.
States must capitalize
The government is well-informed about promoting the adoption of CCUS technology in India. Technology transfer, promoting research and development, and private sector participation are eyed to calibrate its potential. Building the ecosystem to incentivize these factors as a multipronged approach may benefit the larger cause. The nation’s 85 percent of cement factories are concentrated in Tamil Nadu. In Petrochemicals, Gujarat is the powerhouse, contributing about 30 percent of production and 50 percent of the nation’s chemical manufacturing. Andhra Pradesh is a key player in pharmaceuticals. Hence, it is time that Indian states where heavy industries are concentrated must capitalize on carbon capture and storage, envisaging its wide and long term potential. In a stark dissonance between industrial development and carbon emissions, CCUS is the harmonizer – provided deliberate and collective action.
These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.