LA State Rep. Chuck Owen (R-Rosepine): Time For A Fundamental Debate On Carbon Capture

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A few weeks ago, I was in a meeting in the great City of Pineville. I was invited to an open forum on the topic of carbon capture utilization and sequestration (CCUS) at Pineville High School. A group of academic proponents/experts on CCUS and representatives of the executive and legislative branch were in attendance to address how CCUS works, why some believe it is needed and to address the possible future of this activity in Central Louisiana, primarily in Rapides Parish.

Also in attendance was a representative from a firm that wishes to conduct business in Rapides Parish by repurposing an abandoned industrial facility and setting up an operation to process timber products and waste. The business has a laudable goal—to produce energy from wood byproducts and create and sell energy from these processes. This would be a good business for central Louisiana.

Part of the business’ model and requirement for the firm, however, is that carbon emitted from the production facility be captured and transported to a below ground permanent storage site. Permanently stored. Also known as being sequestered. The business representative told the audience that their effort would be contained to producing the energy, capturing emissions and then turning that carbon over to someone (another business) who would transport it by pipeline and bury it “somewhere else.”

The “somewhere else” is in Vernon Parish; for those who live in south Louisiana, Vernon is due west of Rapides. The business representative seemed reticent to discuss the fact that the carbon would mostly be transported out of Rapides and into Vernon. As a resident of Vernon, needless to say, I was paying careful attention.

At one point, the representative used the phrase the “hub in Vernon” when referring to the location of the sequestered carbon. In recent months, I’ve seen a number of articles and publications that indicate a number of pipelines from around Louisiana and from other parts of the country all seeming to converge in central Louisiana—right in Vernon Parish. Some of these articles have graphics. I’ve seen these and have wondered who cooked up the idea or who has propagated the notion that Vernon Parish would a good place for all of this to converge. Who came up with the idea of the “hub?” And why?

The day after the Pineville meeting, I asked a representative from the Department of Energy and Natural Resources where this idea originated. This person admitted he didn’t know and told me it had been in place since he arrived as part of the new gubernatorial administration. Basically, he told me “we inherited” this idea. I asked him to look deeper.

He called back inside of a day and told me. It was the Biden Administration’s Environmental Protection Agency who cooked up this idea.

So let’s set the scene of where we are right now:

There are people who think carbon needs to be captured for any litany of reasons. I think it’s a fool’s errand, but some people want to capture it for environmental reasons. Got it.

Some people believe that the captured carbon needs to be deposited under ground in order to achieve some GOAL. Depending on who you talk to, the goal is different. One of two types of people believe carbon needs to be buried:

Leftists who say we need to capture it because of climate change. Also a debatable point. I think it’s a crazy idea, but regardless, it’s what they believe; or

Money-grubbers. These are folks who grovel to get businesses to come here and say we have to capture and bury carbon because “markets demand” we decarbonize. As an aside: I’ve debunked this myth a number of times and no one has provided me any receipts to the contrary.

But, those are the two camps who want to bury carbon—leftist idealogues and money grubbers who want to grovel to left wing lunatics, who are probably are influenced by the leftist idealogues.

While all of this is being done in the academic and political world, someone, somewhere is deciding a rural portion of Western Louisiana should be offered up as a location for carbon to be buried. Whoever that someone or someone’s were, I don’t know, but I resolutely know this: This carbon “hub” is not wanted in the place envisioned.

Vernon Parish has been selected as essentially a dump site for below-ground, man-made industrial waste. Whoever decided this did NOT coordinate the effort across the expanse of government entities in the parish. I’ve asked a number of elected officials, and not one tells me anyone has been approached with the idea of a huge carbon “hub.”

There are many, many reasons why doing carbon sequestration is a bad idea. I’ve talked and written about these things for some time. But the main reason why this is a bad idea is that few, if any people who live around here want this waste burial activity to come into our parish. I’ve not met more than 5 people who are in support of burying one drop of carbon in our ground, much less the many millions of tons that are envisioned.

The idea of burying industrial waste on a mass scale needs to be something our citizens get to decide. An unnamed bureaucrat from the previous left-wing administration should not get to decide our future. We should decide it.

What concerns me is that if someone decided Vernon’s future without consulting actual people who LIVE in Vernon. This thought leads me to concern for fellow citizens around Louisiana: What other bad ideas have been draped around the neck of our citizens by people who aren’t from here? While I am concerned about my home parish, I am concerned for the WHOLE State. The good people in places like Allen, Livingston, Rapides and other places are also being targeted for this activity as well.

The 2025 Legislative Session has been over for a month. My effort to get a local option on this activity did not pass the legislature. Be advised I will bring it back next year and I will have more allies.

Until such time: I implore anyone who wants to discuss the utility of capturing and burying carbon to come out of hiding and let’s have a debate. You bring a team, we’ll bring a team and let’s have a debate. Let’s debate the utility and let’s debate the world markets. We can even debate climate change. But most importantly, let’s debate whether its right or wrong to force something like this on communities and regions where no one really wants it to happen. If any of you have the nerve to accept this challenge, I’m not hard to find. Name the place. Name the time. Bring the receipts.

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