Vernon Parish Carbon Capture

Project Overview

• Primary Projects: Central Louisiana Regional Carbon Storage Hub (Vernon Parish One CCS Site); Denbury Draco Sequestration Hub
• Operators: CapturePoint Solutions, LLC; Denbury Carbon Solutions
• Scale: Projects aim to inject and sequester millions of metric tons of CO2 annually, with long-term plans exceeding 140 million metric tons over 20–25 years.

Citizen Concerns About Communication and Transparency - Limited Public Information

• Sparse Local Outreach: Residents report minimal proactive communication about the timeline, safety implications, and impacts of large-scale CCS activities in their parish.
• Opaque Permitting: Environmental review and permitting processes have occurred largely between project developers and state or federal agencies, with little layman-accessible or timely information made available to the broader public.
• Shifting Authorities: The transfer of permitting authority from the EPA to the State of Louisiana further complicated clarity for residents, as information channels, points of contact, and notice procedures changed without accessible, community-specific explanations.

Inadequate Notice and Opportunity for Input

• Technical, Inaccessible Notices: When notifications about CCS projects were issued, documentation was often highly technical and not distributed broadly, preventing many affected citizens from fully grasping the risks, timelines, or practical implications for their properties and daily lives.
• Feedback Mechanisms Unclear: There is no evidence that effective, accessible channels existed for citizens to comment or raise objections meaningfully on the placement of injection wells, monitoring, or mitigation plans.

Environmental and Land Use Ambiguities

• Lack of Clarity on Site Impacts: Residents have little information regarding how CCS activities will affect timberlands, surface rights, water resources, and long-term land use in Vernon Parish.
• Monitoring and Incident Reporting: While developers are required to monitor and submit data to regulatory agencies, those reports are not routinely or clearly communicated to the public in a form they can use to understand ongoing risks or project compliance.

Community Trust and Engagement

• Erosion of Trust: Many locals feel decisions about carbon storage were made with limited community engagement, increasing mistrust of both the operators and regulatory authorities.
• Unclear Mitigation Plans: As of the latest available reports, no concrete mitigation or compensation measures for local landowners or communities were available.

Summary Table: Key Citizen Complaints