Liverpool Bay's carbon capture and storage network is now roughly 50% complete after Eni CCUS Holding finished installing the Douglas CCS platform offshore North West England — the world's first purpose-built offshore platform dedicated to CO2 transport and storage.

The joint venture between Italian energy major Eni and BlackRock's Global Infrastructure Partners completed construction and commissioning of the platform in under 18 months. The numbers behind the install are heavy: an 1,885-ton topside module, a 1,755-ton jacket, and eight foundation seabed piles totaling 730 tons.

The platform now sits as the central offshore gathering hub for the HyNet industrial decarbonization cluster.

What does the platform actually do?

The hub collects CO2 captured from heavy industrial sites across North West England and North Wales. Once fully operational, it will route incoming carbon streams through repurposed subsea pipelines into depleted natural gas fields for permanent geological sequestration in the Liverpool Bay basin.

The design mixes purpose-built topsides with existing offshore oil and gas infrastructure. That approach cuts capital intensity and lets the project lean on decades of geological reservoir data already gathered from the basin.

In short: the project reuses pipes and reservoir knowledge from the region's gas era rather than building everything from scratch.

How much money and how many jobs?

Roughly 60% of total project capital expenditure is flowing through UK-based supply chain partners, according to the company.

The construction phase supports more than 2,000 jobs. Once operations begin, the network is expected to sustain 200 to 300 permanent roles across an operational lifespan exceeding 25 years.

The company framed the project as strategic rather than standalone. "Liverpool Bay CCS forms part of Eni CCUS Holding's portfolio of CCS initiatives and represents a key project in the company's strategy to develop CO2 transportation and storage infrastructure to support industrial decarbonisation at scale," Eni stated.

Where does HyNet stand now?

The Douglas install moves the broader HyNet cluster to approximately 50% completion across its full construction scope. That separates built capacity from what remains on paper: half the network's infrastructure is physically in place, and half is still to come.

The project hasn't cleared every hurdle. Campaigners have filed a lawsuit against the HyNet carbon capture project, a legal challenge that remains live as construction advances.

On the financing side, Eni CCUS Holding has signaled European growth ambitions, with more than $500 million in financing pointing to continued investor appetite for CO2 transport and storage infrastructure.

What happens next?

Watch for the remaining 50% of HyNet's construction scope to close out, and for the UK court to rule on the campaigners' legal challenge — the two milestones that will decide whether the world's first offshore CO2 hub starts storing carbon on schedule.