It would take 3.3 billion trees and half of Greece’s land to absorb about 66 million tonnes of carbon dioxide over a decade. A carbon-capture project in northeastern Greece wants to match this amount.
EnEarth, a subsidiary of the Greek oil and natural gas company Energean, is developing one of Europe’s largest carbon storage operations in the Kavala Gulf region. That’s where the Prinos oilfield is located, and its wells will be used for the carbon storage.
“Technologies about capturing and storing carbon emissions aren’t new,” says Katerina Sardi, managing director of Energean and EnEarth in Greece. “Almost 25 years ago, this approach was already on the table. Back in the early 2000s, I worked on projects involving carbon. Today, I’m proud to see these solutions finally being put into practice.”
How carbon capture and storage work
Carbon emissions that would be released into the air will be collected at industrial sites in Greece and other nearby countries. Then the carbon, some of it compressed into a liquid, will be transported to the Prinos storage site in Greece. Three offshore oil or gas platforms will be used to store carbon in the ground, and one site on land will be used to store carbon in tanks.
“The carbon will be injected deep underground,” says Zoran Stanic, head of the Innovation Fund Unit, a part of EIB Advisory initiative. “Offshore, the platforms were installed nearly 50 years ago for oil, and now the site will be used to safely store carbon in the reservoirs, located four kilometres below the sea surface.”
The site is well-suited to storing carbon. Geological formations that surround the wells have been studied extensively since the 1970s. “We have decades of data confirming its suitability,” Sardi says. “Seismic surveys, drilled wells, and core samples all support long-term storage.”
Carbon could begin arriving at the site in 2027. When fully developed, the annual capacity is expected to be 2.8 million tons of carbon in 2030. The site’s total potential is 66 million tonnes. Greece, Italy, Slovenia and Croatia are expected to use the storage site for companies in heavily emitting sectors such as chemicals, cement and steel, the so-called “hard to abate” industries.
EU expands carbon storage
Carbon storage projects in the European Union remain limited, with most in early planning or development stages. According to Zero Emissions Platform, three projects began operating in 2025 (Sleipner, Snøhvit and Northern Lights in Norway) and one project should start operating in 2026 (Porthos in the Netherlands).
To help it succeed, the Prinos storage site received €270 million in grants from an EU funding programme called the Connecting Europe Facility and from a Greek recovery fund. The project also received a lot of help from the EIB Advisory team.
“This project is not only important for Greece but also for Southeast Europe’s climate efforts,” says Stanic of the EIB Advisory team. “It accelerates development, and positions Prinos as a model for similar initiatives across the Mediterranean.”
EIB Advisory’s financial and technical experts worked with Prinos to develop the project, guiding the business model and improving the project’s ability to attract financing. “The business case is strong given the demand for carbon sequestration in the area,” despite the challenges in attracting businesses interested in storing the carbon, says Matthieu Banal, a financial advisor at EIB Advisory.
EIB Advisory also helped Prinos navigate carbon-capture storage policies and regulation, and to assess how water extracted from the site could be reused.
Carbon storage is essential to achieve the EU goal of reducing net emissions to zero by 2050. Europe wants to increase carbon storage to 50 million tonnes annually by 2030.
“This project is part of a broader ambition to protect European industry and jobs, advance European technology, mitigate climate change and limit global warming to 1.5°C,” Sardi says. “Without effective carbon storage, reaching net-zero becomes much harder, if not impossible.”
The European Investment Bank is also backing a carbon capture project in Stockholm, Sweden. This will be the first large-scale bioenergy plant with carbon capture facilities in the country. The company running it, Stockhold Exergi, received €260 million in April 2025 from the European Investment Bank to help fund the construction. The plant is expected to open in 2028 and to capture 800,000 tonnes of carbon annually, more than the amount emitted from road transport in Stockholm in a year.
EnEarth
Storage limits carbon costs for industry
Cement, steel, and chemicals companies face rising carbon costs under new EU regulations aimed at limiting their emissions. Prinos offers a way to help these companies.
“It is a win-win,” Sardi says. “Industries can store carbon emissions instead of emitting it, staying competitive without harming the environment.” The project also will stimulate economic development in the Gulf of Kavala, creating jobs and diversifying employment. “Young people will have reasons to stay and build their futures here.”
Sardi underscores out that carbon capture and storage provide an essential bridge in Europe’s energy transition. “Without it, Europe’s industrial sector faces a battle for its survival.”
