Innovation at the 3rd Danish CCUS Summit

This was the third summit of the Danish INNO-CCUS programme, the national research and innovation programme for Denmark, which started in 2022. This brought together some 140 researchers and industry professionals to hear the latest results and developments in Denmark, including the 42 current research and innovation projects funded by INNO-CCUS.

Welcomes were provided by Karina Søgaard  (Director of INNO-CCUS) and Jesper Sand Damtoft (Chair of the Board and Cementir) who also launched the “State of CCUS Third Edition” report, comprising a weighty 216 pages with all 198 Danish research and innovation projects (to be available at Home – INNO-CCUS).

A keynote was provided by Professor Sarah Saltzer of Stanford University, who reflected thoughtfully on the worldwide developments in CCUS, set against the scenarios set by the IEA Net Zero Roadmap to 2050, and especially emphasising that the challenge is no longer ‘will it work?’, but ‘can we permit, build and earn trust fast enough’? She also highlighted Stanford’s good work (and their paper) on data on leakages from pipelines, which puts those modest numbers into comparison with other less-obvious CO₂ sources such as Taylor Swift concerts and human exhalation at conferences such as this Danish event.

Henrik Sulsbrück, Head of CCUS Division at the Danish Energy Agency, provided a keynote Q&A session, being both frank and good-natured in responding to the moderator and audience questions about the national policy achievements and lessons learned so far.

Trina Bendixen of Bigadan gave an update on their BECCS project, which will be sending its CO₂ by truck and ship to the Greensands project for storage soon in 2026.

A very interesting update was provided by Juanita Gallego Davila of Cementir about their Aalborg Portland cement CCS project, at the largest cement plant and largest industrial source of CO₂ in Denmark. Juanita described the decision process that led them to choose cryogenic capture technology provided by Air Liquide. This will capture some 2Mt of CO₂ when operational from 2030. This CO₂ will go to an onshore storage site called Greenstore in Jutland, to be operated by Harbour Energy. Site characterisation is underway at the moment. This will be the first commercial-scale onshore storage in Europe. The Danish Technological Institute released a report of their work on a “Social System Analysis” around this project, very interesting on the different approaches taken to local stakeholder engagement and what was most successful and lessons learnt.

In a technical session, Philip Fosbøl of DTU presented their interesting work, which took detailed dynamic measurements of many emission constituents from a mobile amine-based capture plant running in many different configurations, including start-stop. This was part of the CASPER project, which looked at the full value chain for the Aalborg Portland CCS project.

It was also great to catch up with 2026 IEAGHG Summer School alumni Sulafa Abdalmageed, Maria Maigaard Paulsen and Albert Pujol Duran, showcasing some of their work at Aalborg University, funded by INNO-CCUS. Future Leaders and Rising Stars! The 2026 IEAGHG International CCS Summer School was generously hosted by Karina Søgaard and team at INNO-CCUS earlier this summer.

There were very interesting conversations in the margins, but unfortunately, I had to leave the summit early due to UK flight disruptions, so I missed some sessions and the closing keynote.

We are very pleased to have INNO-CCUS as a member of IEAGHG representing Denmark, and I am honoured to chair the International Advisory Board of INNO-CCUS.

Overall, it was good to see the research, innovation and discussions increasingly focused on deployment topics in Denmark, as deployment is actually taking place, with large-scale operations imminent. Go Denmark!