en.Wedoany.com Reported - Air Products & Chemicals Inc. has canceled plans to build a blue hydrogen and carbon capture and storage complex near Burnside in Ascension Parish, Louisiana. The project, originally named the Louisiana Clean Energy Complex (LCEC), was to include a 750-MMcfd blue hydrogen production plant with associated carbon dioxide (CO₂) storage facilities. The project had claimed that, if completed, it would become the world's largest permanent CO₂ storage project.

Air Products confirmed the termination of the complex in a statement in late June. According to the operator, the cancellation was due to the LCEC's expected financial returns no longer meeting the company's stringent return standards. The LCEC was originally scheduled to begin operations in 2026, later postponed to 2028, with a construction cost of $4.5 billion. Prior to the project's cancellation, Air Products had terminated three other U.S. clean energy projects in early February 2025 due to a lack of economic incentives.

Air Products stated that the project cancellation would not affect the company's ongoing commitment to profitably grow its existing operations in Louisiana, which include 18 industrial gas units and the world's largest existing hydrogen pipeline network, serving multiple refinery customers along the U.S. Gulf Coast. In a separate statement, the company said it would responsibly and ethically wind down activities on the proposed site and pipeline easements in Ascension Parish, Lake Maurepas, and surrounding areas, while fulfilling remaining contractual obligations. Post-cancellation activities will also include collaborating with Ascension Parish staff, emergency responders, contractors, and other parties during the phased shutdown to conclude all project-related regulatory and permitting processes and partnerships.

In addition to producing blue hydrogen from hydrocarbon feedstocks, the LCEC planned to capture and permanently store over 5 million tons of CO₂ per year from the production process. Approximately 95% of the CO₂ generated by the complex was expected to be captured, compressed, and transported via pipeline to inland storage sites along a 35-mile pipeline corridor east of the complex. The complex also included a separate production plant and related low-carbon ammonia logistics assets, originally intended to be owned and operated by potential partner Yara International ASA.

According to a presentation submitted to investors on January 30, as of early February, Air Products had completed procurement of all major equipment and approximately 90% of the LCEC's detailed design, but was still in the process of finalizing construction contracts for the project. The cancellation of the LCEC was partly due to a broader reduction in focus on energy transition-related projects across U.S. industry, but the complex had also faced opposition from local residents and environmental groups since its proposed development was announced in 2021.

The day after Air Products announced the cancellation, on July 1, Earthjustice issued a press release noting that the LCEC, if built, would have spanned five parishes in Louisiana, located on the site of the former Orange Grove sugarcane plantation. Local communities expressed concerns about unmarked graves of formerly enslaved individuals on the project property. Area residents also worried about the project's plan to compress and transport industrial CO₂ through a 38-mile pipeline, proposed to be built near a local elementary school and adjacent residential areas, passing through the Maurepas Swamp Wildlife Management Area (MSWMA) near the St. John the Baptist Parish community, and extending to a massive carbon storage system that included an additional pipeline network and 19 platforms distributed across Lake Maurepas.

The MSWMA is one of Louisiana's largest forested coastal wetlands for conservation, an active freshwater fishery for the state, and provides hurricane protection for residents of southern Louisiana. Earthjustice Senior Attorney Corinne Van Dalen stated: "Air Products proposed a project with enormous environmental and human impacts, and our challenge had to match that threat." Earthjustice led challenges to Air Products' permit applications and environmental permit issuances, including a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Clean Water Act Section 404 permit, a Louisiana Department of Energy and Natural Resources coastal use permit, and various U.S. Clean Air Act permits. Earthjustice noted that when Air Products decided to terminate the LCEC, none of the above permits had been obtained.

Despite the project's cancellation, Earthjustice and its coalition of member organizations stated that Air Products still has an agreement with the state to use the pore space beneath Lake Maurepas for industrial-scale carbon storage, an agreement that could be transferred to another company. Sierra Club Senior Organizing Representative Darryl Malek-Wiley said: "We fought for four years because of the significant health risks to the community and Lake Maurepas. If another company takes over a similar project, these risks may not change."