The Government intends to continue engaging with the carbon capture and storage (CCS) industry and is seeking views for a possible second phase of deployment.

It has published a scoping document summarising the policies and actions it has taken to support CCS development in Britain.

DECC has also outlined what it believes to be the main challenges to further commercial deployment and is inviting views and evidence on addressing them.

The Government is investing around £100 million in the Front End Engineering and Design (FEED) stages of two CCS projects – White Rose and Peterhead – as part of its £1 billion CCS Commercialisation Programme.

Energy Secretary Ed Davey said: “The UK is leading the world on CCS and the Government wants to make sure that Britain will be in first place to export this knowledge to a decarbonising global economy.”

He added CCS will help the UK reach its goal of cutting carbon emissions by 50% from 1990 levels “more cheaply” while supporting more than 15,000 jobs every year.

The White Rose project in Yorkshire recently won €300 million in funding from the European Commission.