On Jan. 27, 2021, newly-elected President Joe Biden announced the Justice40 initiative. The initiative’s goals are ambitious: according to the White House’s official website, the plan would require “40 percent of the overall benefits of certain Federal climate, clean energy, affordable and sustainable housing and other investments flow to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized by underinvestment and overburdened by pollution.”

But over three years removed from Biden’s inauguration, many marginalized communities across the country are still suffering from air pollution — and Baton Rouge is no exception. Human Rights Watch reported earlier this year that the air quality in the 85-mile stretch between Baton Rouge and New Orleans is so poor that it has earned the name “Cancer Alley.” 

Aiming to fulfill the Justice40 initiative’s promise to deliver environmental justice to communities like those in Cancer Alley, the Inflation Reduction Act authorized roughly $5 billion in 45Q tax credits to be given to corporations that implement carbon capture technologies, commonly referred to as CCS, to reduce their environmental footprints. 

“Climate change is a really important issue, and this is one of the few tools we have to address it,” said LSU environmental sciences Professor Brian Snyder. “Instead of emitting CO2 into the atmosphere, it is scrubbed from the exhaust, put into a pipeline, and injected into a deep well 5,000 to 10,000 feet below the surface of the Earth.”

But many believe that CCS will only exacerbate environmental problems in Cancer Alley. 

Among the organizations that oppose carbon capture in Cancer Alley is RISE St. James — an environmental justice organization dedicated to fighting the industrial buildout in St. James Parish and beyond. In its “Factsheet on Carbon Capture,”  RISE St. James condemns CCS as a “false solution” to air pollution that “does not move us forward towards a future powered by renewable energy.” 

The organization also points to newly documented scientific disputes over the effectiveness of carbon capture: “CCS proposes to inject CO2 underground and keep it there for thousands of years. However, in nearly every test case, the projects have failed. Huge projects that have promised nearly 100% CO2 capture rate have proved not to be able to meet these goals.” 

There is also growing concern that CCS pipelines pose significant dangers to the communities in which they are constructed. 

While carbon dioxide is a natural feature of the Earth’s atmosphere, exposure to its pure, concentrated form can have serious negative effects on a person’s health. In Sartartia, Mississippi, a ruptured carbon dioxide pipeline caused cars driving on a nearby highway to stop running, children to faint and 45 people to be hospitalized. 

In the coming months, Blue Sky infrastructure will build a large carbon dioxide pipeline — dubbed the River Parish Sequestration Project — through Modeste, Belle Rose and Barton. As RISE St. James documents, there are 18 abandoned wells within three miles of the pipeline, and the project runs within two miles of St. Philip Baptist Church and Belle Rose Elementary School. 

When asked about the dangers CCS may pose to the communities in Cancer Alley, Snyder echoed some of RISE St. James’ concerns. “In my view, the environmental concerns are relatively minor compared to the benefits of removing CO2 … But we should be concerned that corporations aren’t reducing emissions as much as they say, and our emergency response systems definitely could be better.” 

But Snyder maintained that carbon dioxide is sufficiently far from residential areas to minimize the risk of a leak. “Carbon dioxide is non-toxic, and it has to come in an extremely high concentration to harm human health,” he said. “If any CO2 were to be leaked, it would probably release a pretty low concentration — not enough to actually harm people.”

Still, to many environmental activists along Louisiana’s coast, carbon capture does not represent meaningful environmental progress. 

“There is currently a ‘gold rush’ to get projects designed and approved across the state,” RISE St. James observed in their CCS Factsheet. “This pipeline and injection process is being proposed in connection with the rise in new ammonia and hydrogen projects in the River Parishes, as well as existing industry wanting to dump its CO2 underground rather than change to using renewable energy.”