That decarbonisation of the cement and lime industries is a complex and important task will not be news to readers of Cement magazine.

The cleaner and more efficient operations in the sector of recent years have been willingly implemented in good faith, as have improved production technologies, as it strives to close the gap to net zero. Though these innovative efforts are rightly recognised, there remains an unavoidable challenge: the sheer scale of the requirement to decarbonise the twin industries means these efforts cannot alone achieve the desired, full decarbonisation.

The vast process emissions from the heating of limestone cannot be entirely eliminated by added efficiency measures or use of renewable sources of energy. It’s why carbon capture usage and storage (CCUS) is the industry’s key to a lower carbon future, recognised as it is by the independent Climate Change Committee in Carbon Budget 7 (CB7) as the most feasible way of achieving deep decarbonisation in hard-to-abate industries, from chemicals to cement.

The options as set out in CB7 are stark: begin the process of capturing the CO2 now or continue to release it into the atmosphere and never achieve the cleaner future of net zero. The latter is both environmentally and politically untenable.

The Mineral Products Association (MPA) has also lent its support to CCUS, arguing it is the only technology that would enable a true step change reduction in process emissions. Dr Diana Casey, its Executive Director for Energy and Climate Change, placed CCUS at the heart of the organisation’s Roadmap to Beyond Net Zero, where it is cited as having the potential to reduce CO2 emissions by 61% by 2050. This, combined with other technology levers, would enable cement production to achieve net zero by the target year.

However, the acknowledgment of CCUS projects’ role in achieving net zero is tempered by the challenges that rollout and expansion of these developments face.

CCUS suffers from a wholly false perception that it is unproven or unsafe. The technology has in fact been in existence since the 1970s – more than 20 years before the introduction of household technologies like the DVD, which is already well on its way to obsolescence – and currently, safely, utilises thousands of miles of pipelines in projects around the world. The erroneous information out there – a combination of misunderstanding, myth and misinformation – adversely affects confidence in the process across the gamut of stakeholders, from public opinion to political support to investor confidence.

The scale and cost of CCUS is an unavoidable reality. While the technology is mature, deploying it across the country in brand new networks will involve significant capital investment. Yet while the initial costs of implementation will undoubtedly be high, it’s the same for any technology being rolled out on such a scale. In time, like any operation, costs fall as scale increases, the technology continues to innovate and, subsequently, the competition grows.

Perhaps the most significant obstacle to implementation of CCUS networks is the uncertainty surrounding government policy and business models. What’s clear is that the technology works and works well from its implementation around the globe, but the UK’s commercial frameworks and licensing arrangements aren’t so clear. Until these barriers are overcome and clarity is provided by government, it is practically impossible for most CCUS developers to progress and to support the country’s decarbonisation goals.

Dr Casey has reiterated this call for stable commercial and policy frameworks, welcoming government commitments to invest in clusters like Morecambe Net Zero’s (MNZ) Peak Cluster partners. Looking at the alternatives, it is not difficult to see why.

Strictly speaking, there are alternatives to decarbonising traditional UK industries which have supported tens of thousands of jobs and livelihoods for more than a century. Instead of continuing to produce cement domestically and using CCUS to prevent the unavoidable emissions from entering the atmosphere, the UK could allow these vital industries to close down, and instead import cement and lime from overseas. That would be a nonsense, and the result would be decarbonisation via deindustrialisation.

The CO2 would still be emitted, just not in the UK, and the country would lose out on manufacturing jobs, tax revenues and security of supply of vital materials that are all associated with current production in the Peak District heartlands.

The transformative MNZ Peak Cluster project, on the other hand, will safeguard and create 13,000 jobs across its construction and lifetime. It will prevent more than 3 million tonnes of CO2 from entering the atmosphere each year as it will be transported and stored off the North West coast in depleted gas reservoirs with a capacity of around 1 billion tonnes.

Independent economic analysis of MNZ Peak Cluster has demonstrated delivery of a £1.8 bn Gross Value Added boost to the country, which would generate £4 worth of benefits for every pound the project would cost the government.

That’s why CCUS is essential, not optional, for the country’s economic prosperity as much as the environment. Net zero targets are met, vital heartland industries are decarbonised and the UK remains a competitive industrial base. Governmental support for CCUS is the next, vital and logical step.