“Carbon capture and geological storage technologies applied to coal and gas fired electricity generation could provide significant opportunities to reduce carbon dioxide emissions over the period to 2050,” ABARE director Brian Fisher said.

ABARE modeling indicated using carbon capture and geological storage technologies could significantly reduce the global economic costs of meeting an international carbon emissions constraint, because these technologies provide most regions in the world with additional large scale emission abatement opportunities.

“Because of Australia’s high dependence on fossil fuels and availability of geological carbon storage sites, use of these technologies has the potential to have a larger impact on reducing the cost of emission reductions than the world average,” ABARE said.