Louisiana’s major industrial facilities emitted more greenhouse gases last year than almost every other state in the nation, new federal data shows, illustrating the challenges in addressing climate change locally. 

Emissions for 2023 were actually a 2.21% reduction from 2022 totals, but still enough to rank second among U.S. states, according to data from the Environmental Protection Agency. The emissions from the plants in question amounted to just over 144 million tons of greenhouse gases. 

The carbon-related emissions by Louisiana’s 403 major industrial facilities were less than Texas’s 381 million tons from 869 facilities, but above Florida’s 109 million tons from 179 facilities and Indiana’s 109 million tons from 197 facilities.

Facilities that emit 25,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases – including carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated carbon compounds – have been required to report their emissions to EPA each year since 2011. The approximately 8,100 facilities nationwide represent about half the human-caused greenhouse gas emissions in the country. The numbers don’t include emissions from the transportation or agricultural sectors, as well as facilities whose emissions are below the 25,000-ton reporting threshold.

The 2023 national totals from large facilities were down about 4% from 2022, and about 22% from 2011, with that larger reduction credited to decreases in power plant emissions, and despite the tracking of additional emission sources after 2016.

Human-caused greenhouse gases trap energy attempting to leave the Earth, resulting in the atmosphere retaining more heat and holding more moisture. That also results in the world’s oceans holding more heat, increasing sea level rise rates and helping fuel tropical storms and hurricanes. Those processes are often referred to as global warming. 

Increasing temperatures also have been linked to increases in drought conditions and wildfires, and the spread of some diseases and of invasive species.

In Louisiana, climate change is expected to have an increasing role in land loss resulting from sea level rise, in flooding because of more intense rainfall and in more frequent drought conditions.

On its current path, Louisiana would only see 89 million tons fewer emissions by 2050, or 62% of the goal of net zero emissions by that year set by former Gov. John Bel Edwards’ Carbon Initiatives Task Force in 2022.

The task force was allowed to expire by Gov. Jeff Landry when he took office in January, and its action plan is now dormant. Still, the state has moved forward with a variety of efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that it says fits Landry’s support for growth of oil and gas production, while also meeting demands of industry to support low- or no-carbon manufacturing projects. 

“We recognize that diversifying energy sources, increasing energy resilience and providing options for carbon management present new and growing opportunities for job growth and economic development in our state. This is why Louisiana is embracing an all-of-the-above approach to encouraging energy production, from our traditional oil and gas sources to emerging industries such as offshore wind,” said Patrick Courreges, a spokesperson for the Louisiana Department of Energy and Natural Resources.

Louisiana’s top emitting facility is CF Industries’ Donaldson nitrogen manufacturing plant, with 9.4 million tons. But both EPA and the company agree that the reported emission totals do not tell the whole story. That’s because CF Industries uses between 25% and 30% of its carbon emissions to manufacture urea each year, and that percentage is not emitted to the atmosphere.

Louisiana’s numbers also represent increases in greenhouse gases from three natural gas liquefaction facilities. 

Sabine Pass LNG, the state’s second-largest emitter; Venture Global – Cameron Parish, the ninth largest emitter; and Cameron LNG Hackberry, represent 11.7 million tons of the state’s total. Another six LNG facilities for Louisiana have announced plans for construction or are in the permitting process.

The 2023 statistics also don’t recognize efforts to develop carbon capture, utilization, and storage, or CCUS, where carbon dioxide equivalent gases are permanently stored deep underground in injection wells.

Earlier this year, the state Department of Energy and Natural Resources received EPA permission to permit and regulate those facilities in the state. Louisiana was reviewing 26 applications that would include a total of 65 injection wells as of Oct. 2, with many of the facilities planning on permanent storage of 1 million tons or more carbon a year.

That includes CCUS facilities proposed by ExxonMobil that would reduce its future carbon emissions, and may also be used to permanently store as much as 2 million tons a year of carbon from the CF facility.

ExxonMobil also has announced plans to develop CCUS operations off the Texas coast that could store as much as 100 million tons of carbon a year, some of it from Louisiana.

Another potential future effort is the $1.2 billion Project Cypress to build direct air capture facilities in Calcasieu and Caddo parishes, with each eventually expected to remove as much as 1 million metric tons of carbon a year from the air and store it in injection wells. The project expects to receive as much as $550 million from the federal Department of Energy, with the remainder invested by private industry. 

On Thursday, ClimeWorks, one of the private investors in the project, announced it had entered into a long-term agreement with Morgan Stanley to underwrite the cost of removing of 40,000 tons of carbon dioxide from the area through 2037. 

“Louisiana’s natural resources, such as the Mississippi River, gives it the ability to be an international hub for investment in carbon sequestration, with applications being reviewed for more than two dozen proposed CO2 sequestration projects around the state,” Courreges said.

Charles Sutcliffe, a senior adviser for resilience with the National Wildlife Federation who was previously Louisiana’s first state resilience officer, said key parts of Edwards’ climate action plan are still in play under Landry, in part thanks to millions of dollars in federal grants. 

The state received a $3 million grant in 2023 for three years of climate pollution reduction planning and in April won a $156 million Solar for All grant to create solar-powered electricity hubs.