LONDON, Oct 4 Reuters Britain will provide funding of up to 21.7 billion pounds 28.5 billion over 25 years to develop carbon capture and storage CCS technology to curb emissions from energy, industry and hydrogen production in northern England, the government said on Friday.

Britain has a climate target to reach net zero emissions by 2050 and has said CCS will be needed to curb emissions from energy intensive industrial sectors as well as to create jobs.

This gamechanging technology will bring 4,000 good jobs and billions of private investment into communities across Merseyside and Teesside, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves said in a statement.

CCS involves capturing emissions from power plants and industry to enable them to be stored underground. The technology has been available for years but projects globally have failed to take off due to high costs and questions over the amount of carbon being captured.

Britains conservative government that was voted out of office in July had in 2023 promised 20 billion pounds of CCS funding that was never fully awarded.

The two sites in northern England will have a combined annual carbon capture capacity of 8.5 million metric tons a year, equivalent to taking 4 million cars off the road, the government said.

The HyNet North West cluster in Merseyside seeks to capture emissions from industrial plants and store them in depleted gas fields in the Irish Sea. It is being developed by a consortium led by Italian energy…