Yara starts up Europe’s largest CO2 capture plant at Dutch ammonia site

Yara International has started carbon capture operations at its Sluiskil ammonia site in the Netherlands, it said in a statement Sept. 7, marking the start of the largest such plant in Europe.

The facility is designed to capture and liquefy up to 800,000 metric tons/year of CO₂ from ammonia production at the site, shielding those volumes from European carbon taxation under the EU Emissions Trading System.

Platts, part of S&P Global Energy, assessed nearest December EU ETS prices at €84.15/mt ($97.83/mt).

The project marks the first large-scale cross-border industrial CCS link in Europe, connecting Yara's Dutch production hub directly to Norway's Northern Lights permanent subsea storage infrastructure.

Captured CO2 will be liquefied and temporarily stored at Sluiskil before being transported by ship to Øygarden, Norway, where it will be injected 2,600 meters beneath the North Sea seabed.

The project is expected to capture and permanently store approximately 12 million mt of CO₂ over a 15-year period, Yara said.

"The carbon capture facility in Sluiskil proves that large-scale industrial decarbonization is possible today," Svein Tore Holsether, President and CEO of Yara International, said. "As global competition intensifies, Europe must find ways to cut emissions while keeping industry, jobs and critical value chains in Europe."

Yara said the site would enable the company to "further reduce the carbon footprint of its production and support low-carbon value chains across agriculture, industry, energy and shipping."

The inauguration ceremony was attended by EU Commissioner for Climate, Net-Zero and Clean Growth, Wopke Hoekstra, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, Dutch Prime Minister Rob Jetten and Yara's Holsether, underscoring the strategic importance of the cross-border project for European leaders.

"Europe needs practical climate solutions that deliver real emissions reductions while strengthening industrial competitiveness," Hoekstra said in a statement Sept. 7. "This is exactly the kind of project Europe needs to combine climate ambition with a strong and resilient industrial base."

Northern Lights expansion

The 1.5 million mt/year Northern Lights CO2 storage facility in the Norwegian North Sea started commercial operations in 2025, with first supplies from Heidelberg Materials Brevik cement plant.

Heidelberg will supply 400,000 mt/year of CO2 to Northern Lights.

The facility is expected to start receiving further volumes from Ørsted A/S later in 2026. Ørsted has an agreement with Northern Lights to supply 430,000 mt/year from its Asnaes and Avedore biomass power stations in Denmark.

Northern Lights said it would further expand its transport capacity for the second phase of the project — including the addition of larger CO2 tankers from 2028 — which expands capacity to 5 million mt/year.

Stockholm Exergi AB in Sweden and Hafslund Celsio in Norway will supply additional volumes from 2028 and 2029.

Northern Lights is a joint venture between Equinor ASA, TotalEnergies SE and Shell PLC.