The recaptured carbon will be released, because the government decided that it's too expensive to store as originally agreed.

Oil and Energy Minister Åslaug Haga confirmed to newspaper Aftenposten that an agreement the government had with Mongstad partners StatoilHydro, Dong Energy, Shell and Vattenfall was being amended.

The agreement had stated that a test plant due to be operational when the power plant opens in 2010 would recapture 100,000 tons of carbon a year, and that the recaptured carbon dioxide "shall not be emitted into the atmosphere."

Now it's been revealed that the test plant won't be finished until 2011, and that the carbon recaptured won't be stored.

Full-scale carbon recapture and storage for the entire gas power plant at Mongstad won't be operational until 2014.

The carbon storage process proved to be more complicated and more than twice as expensive as planned, Haga said. "We have chosen to use the time needed... to ensure that we carry this out responsibly," she added. She insisted a capture and storage program will eventually be in place.

Officials considered transporting the captured carbon dioxide by ship and storing it in reservoirs tied to the Snow White gas field off northern Norway, "but that proved to be extremely expensive," Haga said, claiming the government could better use the money to buy climate quotas or engage in other environmental projects.

'Outrageous'
Environmentalists and opposition politicians aren't buying the government's reasoning. "This is outrageous," said Frederic Hauge of Bellona. "The agreement to store carbon from the test plant was the reason we gave our support to the project." He claims that dropping the storage requirement makes the entire carbon recapture process vulnerable.

Line Henriette Hjemdal of the Christian Democrats was also among those angry, claiming that the Norwegian government's concern for the climate is reserved for speeches and political posturing.

"Once again, the government is demonstrating that its climate concerns... are downgraded as soon as they begin to cost something," she said.

Noting that Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg recently boasted that the carbon capture and storage at Mongstad would be Norway's equivalent of a moon landing, Hjemdal added: "It can't possibly come as a surprise to the government that a moon-landing project costs money."