The Bureau of Land Management has offered Tallgrass Energy a right-of-way grant covering approximately 480 acres of federally managed underground pore space in Laramie County, Wyoming, for the company's Southeast Wyoming Carbon Dioxide Sequestration Project.

The grant authorizes Tallgrass to use the federal subsurface pore space for permanent CO2 storage once final state authorizations are secured. The Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) retains responsibility for permitting and regulating the Class VI injection wells required for operation. Until those wells receive final DEQ approval, the 480-acre allocation remains a federal access right, not an operating sequestration asset.

Built on a Federal Decision Record

The right-of-way offer marks the primary regulatory follow-up to the BLM's April 2025 decision record approving the project. That record completed an environmental assessment under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), clearing the federal review hurdle before the subsurface access grant could be issued.

The initial project design relies entirely on subsurface federal pore space. It requires no surface infrastructure on BLM-managed public lands — a design choice that narrows the federal footprint to the underground storage volume and shifts remaining permitting work to the state level.

Monetizing Public Subsurface Assets

The grant illustrates the expanding federal framework for monetizing public subsurface assets to support regional carbon capture and storage (CCS) development. For BLM, pore space beneath federal land is now a leaseable commodity in the same administrative channel as traditional rights-of-way.

"This milestone shows how the responsible management of federal resources can support infrastructure development while ensuring that projects advance through the appropriate regulatory processes," said Andrew Kauppila, BLM Rawlins field manager.

"The project puts federal lands to productive use while promoting investment and economic growth in Wyoming."

Hub Positioning in a Regional CO2 Network

The Laramie County hub positions Tallgrass to offer permanent sequestration services to industrial emitters and regional point-source carbon producers seeking connections into Wyoming's growing carbon pipeline network. The company's collaboration with POET on a carbon capture project and the recent Colorado-Wyoming agreement on cross-border CO2 storage signal the regional infrastructure context the hub is designed to serve.

For emitters, the commercial proposition is straightforward: contracted permanent storage capacity in a state that has taken primacy over Class VI well permitting, with federal pore-space access already secured.

What Decides What Happens Next

The federal side is now substantially complete — a NEPA environmental assessment, an April 2025 decision record, and a right-of-way grant for the 480-acre pore space. The project's next milestone sits with the Wyoming DEQ: final Class VI injection well approvals. Those permits determine when the hub converts from an approved federal allocation into operating sequestration capacity available to emitters.