A CLEAN START FOR CARBON CAPTURE

Outlay of ₹20,000 crore proposed over five years to improve tech in power, steel, cement, refineries and chemicals

- Rituraj Baruah & Vijay C Roy

India will roll out a scheme to incentivize carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) technologies with an outlay of ₹20,000 crore for a period of five years, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Sunday.

Presenting the Union budget FY27, Sitharaman said government will incentivize these technologies to scale up and achieve higher readiness levels in end-use applications across sectors. CCUS would be used across five key sectors: power, steel, cement, refineries and chemicals.

“Aligning with the roadmap launched in December 2025, CCUS technologies at scale will achieve higher readiness levels in end-use applications across five industrial sectors, including power, steel, cement, refineries, and chemicals. An outlay of ₹20,000 crore is proposed over the next five years,” she said.

On 2 December, the science and technology department launched the 'R&D Roadmap to Enable India’s Net Zero Targets through Carbon Capture, Utilization and Storage’.