“Project Cypress” to receive up to $600 million to develop carbon removal hub in Calcasieu

LAKE CHARLES, La. (KPLC) - The U.S. Entergy Department has announced that one of two new carbon removal projects will be located in Calcasieu Parish in what officials call the largest investment in “engineered carbon removal” in history. Totaling an investment of $1.2 billion, the two projects in Calcasieu and Texas claim they will create 5,000 jobs for local workers and people formerly employed in the fossil fuel industry.

Carbon removal, which does not yet exist on a meaningful scale, involves removing carbon dioxide from the air and would greatly aid the U.S. goal of net zero carbon emissions.

The second project will be built in Kleberg County, Texas with both projects claiming they will be able to capture up to one million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year initially. A representative of the Texas project said it will scale up to remove 30 million metric tons per year once fully operational.

U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, M.D. says Louisiana will receive a total of $500 - $600 million in grant funding for the Direct Air Capture (DAC) Hub. This funding was made possible through the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and is the single largest award to come from the legislation.

The Calcasieu portion of the project has been named Project Cypress and has received an initial $50 million in funding to begin the development of the DAC hub. The exact amount of funding the project will receive is still being negotiated and the exact location of the project has not been released.

Battelle will act as the DAC Hub owner in partnership with technology providers Climeworks Corporation and Heirloom Carbon Technologies, Inc.

Project Cypress intends to rely on Gulf Coast Sequestration (GCS) for the offtake and underground storage of captured atmospheric CO2. The owner of GCS, the Stream family of companies, is also supporting Project Cypress as the landowner and lessor of the host site in Calcasieu Parish and will provide land suitable for the construction, installation, commissioning, operation, and maintenance of the DAC facilities developed by Climeworks and Heirloom.

Louisiana State University is also receiving $2,999,960.00 for the Pelican-Gulf Coast Carbon Removal project to build a examine additional DAC hub opportunities in Louisiana.