Carbon capture will be one of the big issues in the upcoming legislative session, which gets underway in less than a week. Senate President Cameron Henry acknowledges that it’s a hot-button issue relating to the oil and gas industry.
“It is something that is required for industry coming to Louisiana. Louisiana has to come to grips with that and find a happy medium to it,” Henry said.
Henry says the oil and gas industry is a major economic driver for the state, and local governments need to keep that in mind when navigating the issue.
“If the parishes decide, ‘We don’t want that type of industry here,’ that’s a decision that they will have to make.
But in the same sense, those parishes can’t come to the state and say, ‘Look, we need money for roads and bridges because we don’t have any economic engine.’ Well, you just chased one away,” Henry explained.
House Speaker Phillip DeVillier says he supports carbon capture.
“I think it’s something that we need to learn as much as we can about and make sure that it’s done safely in Louisiana. I’ve even been to sites where they do it in Texas. They’re doing it successfully there, and they’re doing it safely there,” DeVillier said.
DeVillier acknowledges, though, that this is something that people have a lot of concerns about, and he has an open door to listen to those concerns.