Carbon Capture, Sequestration, and Mitigation

Our Approach

We help our clients navigate and benefit from federal tax credit regimes, such as IRC Section 45Q, voluntary carbon credit programs, federal renewable fuel programs, U.S. Department of Energy and U.S. Department of Agriculture financing opportunities and state level initiatives, such as California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS). Our clients include, project developers, public power, industrials, private equity funds, tax equity investors, issuers, underwriters, and lenders.

As an early thought-leader in the CCS space, Nixon has actively participated in the dialogue relating to IRC 45Q and related IRS guidance and regulations, OCC bank regulations relating to tax credit financing, and proposed low carbon legislative initiatives. Our attorneys foster cross-industry discussions and education designed to accelerate investment in, and the transition to, CCS and other carbon mitigation technologies and projects. As the Biden administration moves to reset the national climate agenda, Nixon attorneys will be tracking these developments and will advise our clients of new opportunities, required operational changes to their businesses, and shifts in corporate ESG and climate-related disclosure.

Thought Leadership

NP Comment Letter to IRS 8/3/2020

• Comment Letter: Comments to Proposed 45Q Regulations to the IRS

Webinars and Conferences

• Carbon Capture and Energy: Everything’s Bigger in Texas
  Recording
• The Role of Debt in the Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) Capital Stack
  Recording | Materials
• Insurance Solutions for 45Q Carbon Capture Projects
  Recording | Materials
• Financing Carbon Capture Technologies; IRC 45Q Monetization Strategies
  Recording | Materials

Publications

• Hydrogen hubs are coming
• Leveraging Infrastructure Cash For Carbon Transport Projects
• Private activity bonds: A new option for financing carbon capture projects
• It is shaping up to be a big year for clean hydrogen in Washington DC
• New CCUS guidance from IRS—The parts are greater than the whole
• OCC codifies rules governing national banks’ lending power to make tax equity investments
• Energy Insights: 45Q Carbon Capture Insurance Solutions
• Energy Insights: IRS proposes carbon capture tax credit qualifications
• The ‘Future’ is now: Responses due July 4, 2019, to IRC Carbon Oxide Sequestration Tax Credit ‘Request for Comments’

Our team has also been quoted in Law360, S&P Global, Power Finance & Risk, and Inframation.

Representative CCS, Carbon Mitigation, and Renewable Fuels Experience

• Representation of OGCI Climate Investments Holdings LLP in connection with its acquisition of $10 million of Series C Convertible Preferred Stock in a private placement (PIPE) issued by NextDecade, the developer of a 27 mtpa LNG export facility in South Texas along with one of the largest carbon capture and storage projects in North America. The Rio Grande LNG facility is expected to be the largest and greenest U.S. LNG export solution linking Permian Basin and Eagle Ford Shale natural gas to the global LNG market. Next Decade plans to capture and permanently store more than 5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year representing over 90% of its emissions, making it one of North America’s largest US CCS projects in development.
• Counsel to Fortune 100 industrial company in connection with development of two large scale industrial greenfield projects designed to benefit from IRC 45Q tax credits, including tax equity structuring advice
• Counsel to OGCI Climate Investments in connection with its investments in certain carbon capture and sequestration projects and methane reduction projects
• Counsel to OGCI Climate Investments in connection with its investment in a proposed carbon capture and sequestration project involving an existing gas fired power generation project together with Starwood Energy and Elysian Ventures
• Counsel to leading national biogas developer
• Counsel to leading fund trading environmental credits
• Disclosure counsel to the Power Authority of the State of New York on The Bond Buyer’s 2020 Northeast Deal of the Year, which was the largest public power green bond transaction of all time
• Disclosure counsel to the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority on The Bond Buyer’s 2019 ESG/Green Financing Deal of the Year, which was awarded for its $545 million offering Proposition C sales tax revenue bonds
• Bond and disclosure counsel to an irrigation district, which operates generation, transmission, and distribution of electric assets, on a bond series which were designated as “Green Bonds” as the proceeds were used to finance the purchase of a photovoltaic renewable energy project