seeing green

AT&T makes deal with Oxy for carbon credits

Here's 1PoinFive's newest customer on its Texas CCUS project. Photo via 1pointfive.com

Telecommunications giant AT&T has agreed to purchase carbon removal credits from 1PointFive, the carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration (CCUS) subsidiary of Houston-based Occidental Petroleum.

Financial details weren’t disclosed.

The carbon credits will be tied to STRATOS, 1PointFive’s first large-scale direct air capture (DAC) facility. The billion-dollar project is being built near Odessa.

“AT&T’s carbon removal credit purchase is another proof point of the vital role that [DAC] can play in providing a high-integrity and durable solution to help organizations address their emissions,” Michael Avery, president and general manager of 1PointFive, says in a news release.

The AT&T deal comes just one month after 1PointFive announced a similar agreement with Milwaukee-based Rockwell Automation, which specializes in industrial automation and digital transformation.

In November, Occidental announced that New York City-based investment manager BlackRock was chipping in $550 million as part of a joint venture to build STRATOS. The project, set to be completed in 2025, is designed to capture up to 500,000 metric tons of carbon emissions once it’s fully online.

Under 1PointFive’s deal with Dallas-based AT&T, CO2 underpinning the removal credits will be sucked out of the air and stored in underground salt-water formations.

In conjunction with the DAC deal, 1PointFive has joined AT&T’s Connected Climate Initiative, an effort aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions by one gigaton by 2035.

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A View From HETI

Houston U.S. representatives and others from Texas are pushing the Trump administration to reinstate a portion of the $7 billion Biden-era Solar for All program, which aimed to help low-income families reduce their energy costs.. Photo via Pixabay

Eight Democratic members of the U.S. House from Texas, including two from Houston, are calling on the Trump administration to restore a nearly $250 million solar energy grant for Texas that’s being slashed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

In a letter to Lee Zeldin, head of the EPA, and Russell Vought, director of the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB), the House members urged the two officials to reinstate the nearly $250 million grant, which was awarded to Texas under the $7 billion Biden-era Solar for All program. The Texas grant was designed to assist 28,000 low-income households in installing solar panels, aiming to reduce their energy bills.

“This administration has improperly withheld billions in congressionally appropriated funding that was intended to benefit everyday Americans,” the letter stated.

The letter claimed that numerous court rulings have determined the EPA cannot repeal already allocated funding.

“Congress made a commitment to families, small businesses, and communities across this country to lower their utility bills and reduce harmful pollution through investments in clean energy. The Solar for All program was part of that commitment, and the EPA’s actions to rescind this funding effectively undermine that congressional intent,” the House members wrote.

The six House members who signed the letter are:

  • U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia of Houston
  • U.S. Rep. Al Green of Houston
  • U.S. Rep. Greg Casar of Austin
  • U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Dallas
  • U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Austin
  • U.S. Rep. Julie Johnson of Dallas
  • U.S. Rep. Marc Veasey of Fort Worth

The nearly $250 million grant was awarded last year to the Harris County-led Texas Solar for All Coalition.

In a post on the X social media platform, Zeldin said the recently passed “One Big Beautiful Bill” killed the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, which would have financed the $7 billion Solar for All program.

“The bottom line is this: EPA no longer has the statutory authority to administer the program or the appropriated funds to keep this boondoggle alive,” Zeldin said.

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