Not Under My Backyard: One German Town's Fight against CO2 Capture Technology

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The site is equipped with monitoring devices that would shut down the system as soon as any leak is discovered. But even if CO2 were to creep into the drinking water despite all the safety precautions taken, scientists say it would merely carbonate the water, not unlike a soda.

CO2 , though, is heavier than air and could become dangerous if mass quantities were to collect at a single location, like in a valley. If CO2 reaches a concentration of 5 percent, it can cause headaches and dizziness. At 8 percent, it can cause respiratory failure. But researchers like GFZ's Michael Kühn argue that those risks are extremely limited. "If you hold your head under water long enough, you will also die," he says with a laugh.

When the federal government first proposed a law promoting research into carbon capture and storage, the scientists on the German Advisory Council on the Environment issued a statement regarding potential risks associated with CCS. The independent advisors to the government included the example of Lake Nyos in Cameroon. A volcanic eruption there caused carbon dioxide gas to escape from the lake, killing 1,700 people as far as 27 kilometers (about 17 miles) away. But S. Julio Freedmann, a scientist studying CCS at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, told the ClimateWire news service that the disaster at Nyos was directly related to the volcano.

"The experience with the storage of natural gas makes one optimistic," climate economist Ottmar Edenhofer of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Research told SPIEGEL in an interview last year. "It is very probable that the stored CO2 would remain in the ground for thousands of years. Any escaped gas would immediately mix with the air and become harmless."

Fifteen Lost Years?

Despite the extremely remote chance of CCS creating toxic clouds, residents in towns like Beeskow, which has a population of around 8,000, are nevertheless concerned. As part of the federal government's legislation, compensation funds are foreseen for property owners living above the storage area -- a move that has raised the suspicions of locals. "If this technology is so safe, then why do we need to be compensated?" asks Udo Schulze, a member of a group in Beeskow protesting the plans. Schulze, who owns a local pub, meets every week with about 20 other opponents to organize their challenge against Vattenfall.

Others oppose CCS for philosophical reasons -- seeing it as the wasteful allocation of funds to an unsustainable fossil fuel technolgy. "In my view, CCS is fundamentally wrong," says Beeskow Mayor Steffen. "It was invented to keep the old-fashioned way of producing energy from coal alive."

And they argue the technology could prove to be a waste of time. "If we see in 15 years that the technology isn't working, then we will have lost those years," warns Anike Peters of Greenpeace Germany. "CCS leads to a dead end and just serves as an excuse to keep generating power from coal," she adds. Peters and others would like to see the money now being used to investigate ways to make coal cleaner in other ways -- to promote renewable energies, for example.

'Risks and Opportunities'

In Beeskow, opponents believe they have good chances of success for two reasons. In 2009, Kess was part of an effort to prevent Vattenfall from building a new soft coal power plant in Berlin. Under pressure from local residents, the company abandoned its plans. Now, he is determined to repeat this success in Beeskow.

Another historical example also gives them hope. The same year Kess fought Vattenfall in Berlin, German energy company RWE sought to open up a CCS facility in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein -- but ultimately failed. Residents there refused to live on top of large deposits of carbon dioxide -- and their sentiment was backed by the state government, comprised of the CDU and the normally business friendly Free Democratic Party (FDP).

"The company didn't provide enough information about the risks and opportunities of CCS to residents and politicians," says Michael von Abercron, a state parliamentarian for the CDU in Schleswig-Holstein.

Now, Brandenburg residents are hoping that the government of Schleswig-Holstein will vote against the new law in the Bundesrat, Germany's upper legislative chamber. "(Schleswig-Holstein Governor) Carstenson has to say no," demands Peer Jürgens, a member of the Left Party who attended the Beeskow protest planning meeting.

Steep Price Tag

"Right now, the law is just a draft and we can't say how we will vote," von Abercron, says. "Every state has to be able to decide on its own." In the past, however, Governor Carstensen has indicated he would oppose the legislation. His opposition helped derail a first attempt by Merkel to introduce CCS legislation in 2009 in her previous government.

"Some people want to make the second and third step before the first," says Thomas Domres of the Left Party in Brandenburg. "First we need to do more research, and then we can decide."

If all else fails in the city's opposition to the CCS project, Mayor Steffen is hoping that the steep price alone will ultimately scare utility companies away. He argues that the technology is "too difficult and expensive to implement." Existing power plants would have to be outfitted with an expensive capturing device, and studies suggest that commercial carbon-capture coal plants would spend €40 to €60 ($50 to $80) for every ton of CO2 they avoid emitting.

Europe has an emissions trading program that provides incentives to utility companies to adopt greener energies, but with certificates currently trading at around €14 ($18) per ton, it may be a long time before carbon capture and storage is attractive to companies on a broad scale.

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• Part 1: One German Town's Fight against CO2 Capture Technology
• Part 2: 'An Excuse to Keep Generating Power from Coal'