Talos Wins Bid for Texas Carbon Storage Site

Talos Energy Inc. (NYSE: TALO) and Carbonvert Inc have been selected as the sole winning bidder partnership for the Texas General Land Office’s (GLO) Jefferson County carbon storage site, Talos has revealed.

The bid was selected as the only successful proposal among twelve submissions and the Texas School Land Board unanimously approved awarding the lease to Talos and Carbonvert, subject to finalization of lease terms, the company noted. The process will now enter into an exclusive phase where Talos and Carbonvert will negotiate a lease agreement with the GLO staff based on the terms of the Talos bid and the terms included in the original request for proposal from the GLO, Talos outlined. Final terms are said to be subject to the approval of the Texas School Land Board.

Located near Beaumont and Port Arthur, the project site encompasses a total land area of over 40,000 gross acres and is located offshore in Texas state waters in the Gulf of Mexico. Talos, which will be the operator of the project, expects the development can ultimately sequester approximately 225 to 275 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from industrial sources in the area.

“This is an exciting announcement for Talos and Carbonvert as we advance our carbon capture initiative from concept towards our first tangible project site,” Talos President and Chief Executive Officer Timothy S. Duncan said in a company statement.

“With this award, we are positioned to become among the first independent U.S. energy companies with an identified site dedicated to carbon sequestration, further advancing our leadership among peers in this rapidly developing space,” he added.

“The project site possesses favorable geological characteristics and close commercial proximity to support an attractive project in the future. This is the first of several steps in our strategy to build multiple carbon capture and storage sites along the United States Gulf Coast where we can use Talos’ core competencies to operate these important projects,” Duncan went on to say.

Talos highlighted that its bid submission pre-dated the company’s exclusive joint venture with Storegga Geotechnologies Limited, described as a European leader in carbon capture and storage, to pursue carbon capture and sequestration throughout the U.S. Gulf Coast. The company announced that it had formed this joint venture on June 8.

Talos is an independent exploration and production company focused on safely and efficiently maximizing long-term value through its operations, its website states. Back in May, the company announced that it had further strengthened its environmental, social and governance (ESG) commitments with the establishment of long-term emissions reductions targets and further linked executive compensation to ESG performance. Talos has now established a target of 30 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions intensity by 2025 and ESG-driven metrics have been increased to account for 20 percent of the management’s annual incentive plan.

Carbonvert Inc. is a newly formed carbon capture and storage project development and finance company that simplifies decarbonization for industrial facilities. It was established in late 2020 by Alex Tiller and Jan Sherman. The GLO, which is the oldest state agency in Texas, was formed to determine who owned what and where after the Texians and Tejanos won independence, according to its site. Today, it manages state lands, operates the Alamo, helps Texans recovering from natural disasters, helps fund Texas public education through the Permanent School Fund, provides benefits to Texas Veterans and manages the vast Texas coast, its site states.

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