Exxon Pours Billions into Meeting Rebound in Carbon Capture Demand

Exxon hopes to profit by taking back some of what it helps put out into the world. 

For the oil major, one of the world’s biggest corporate emitters of greenhouse gases, that means sucking in those very same emissions. The company is now investing billions to build out a vast infrastructure for carbon capture and storage (CCS), according to a Financial Times report this weekend. It’s a sign that the once-hot yet heavily contested carbon credit economy might be making a comeback. And yes, it’s driven in part by the artificial intelligence boom.

Not so Easy Being Green

One study projects that the AI rollout could contribute as much as 44 metric tons a year of additional carbon emissions from 2024 through 2030. Since the big tech firms behind it still maintain a pretense of climate consciousness, a new tailwind has formed for the carbon capture and storage industry. That’s an opportunity for Exxon, which the FT said is expanding and connecting customers to its 900-mile network of underground carbon transfer pipelines.

If it feels surprising or unexpected to read the words “carbon capture” in 2026, it should. Investment into the technology, as well as into the carbon credit economy writ large, has been ebbing more than flowing recently, though Exxon’s push is just one of several signals that a revival may be on the horizon: 

• Corporate purchases of carbon credits last year fell to the lowest level since 2020, according to BloombergNEF data. 
• Meanwhile, global investment in CCS technology came in at $6.6 billion last year, about half the 2023 peak, according to BloombergNEF data seen by the FT. But that was an increase from just $4.1 billion in 2024, with the number of commercially operating CCS plants rising by one-third to reach 77, while another 44 plants are under construction.

“We see a clear decoupling of market demand from political cycles, as corporate action […] replaces government action as the primary driver of green material or clean electron demand,” Brenna Casey, carbon capture associate at BloombergNEF, told the FT.

Notes from the Underground: Of course, carbon credits fell out of favor for a reason, with critics of all political stripes claiming much of the carbon credit market amounted to dubious “greenwashing.” Exxon, meanwhile, has received local political pushback on its mostly Louisiana-based CCS infrastructure buildout, with some skeptical of the company’s plans to sequester the carbon dioxide in deep underground rock formations.