On Wednesday, the German Federal Cabinet passed a bill to enable the capture, storage and export of carbon dioxide in Germany. Compared to an earlier draft of the Carbon Capture and Storage Act (KSpG), the nature conservation requirements for potential carbon dioxide storage areas in the German North Sea have been tightened. For example, storage beneath marine conservation areas is now also to be ruled out if the borehole through which the CO₂ is to be injected is located outside these conservation areas. In addition, CCS drilling is also prohibited in an exclusion zone of eight kilometers around protected areas.