New U.K. Carbon Capture and Storage Competition Under Way

Researched by Industrial Info Resources Europe (Galway, Ireland)--The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) has published the first U.K. "CCS Roadmap," which sets out the steps that the government is taking to develop what it calls "a new, world-leading carbon capture and storage (CCS) industry" in the 2020s. Also, U.K. Energy and Climate Change Secretary Edward Davey has launched a new competition for carbon capture and storage.

The "CCS Commercialisation Programme" is a new competition that is designed to drive down costs by supporting practical experience in the design, construction and operation of commercial-scale CCS, with £1 billion ($1.58 billion) of capital funding, plus additional support. The roadmap sets aside £125 million ($200 million) for research and development, including £13 million ($20 million) for a new U.K. CCS research centre, and outlines planned long-term contracts and commitments to working with industry to address developing labour skills, supply chain, and storage and infrastructure development through learning from other international projects.

Edward Davey commented: "The potential rewards from CCS are immense: a technology that can de-carbonise coal and gas-fired power stations and large industrial emitters, allowing them to play a crucial part in the U.K.'s low carbon future." What we are looking to achieve, in partnership with industry, is a new, world-leading CCS industry, rather than just simply projects in isolation--an industry that can compete with other low-carbon sources to ensure the security and diversity of our electricity supply, an industry that can make our energy-intensive industries cleaner, and an industry that can bring jobs and wealth to our shores. The CCS industry could be worth £6.5 billion ($10.3 billion) a year to the U.K. economy by late next decade, as we export U.K. expertise and products."

Two CCS projects already have announced their participation in the competition: Teesside Low Carbon and Capture Power. Teesside Low Carbon is a consortium of BOC U.K. (Windlesham, Surrey), which is part of the Linde Group (ETR:LIN) (Munich, Germany); International Power (OTC:IPRPY) (London); National Grid plc (NYSE:NGG) (London); Fairfield Energy (Staines); Premier Oil (FTSE:PMO) (London); and Progressive Energy (Stonehouse, Gloucestershire), which has a planned integrated gasification combined-cycle (IGCC) project that forms the anchor for the development of a power and industrial CCS cluster in Teesside and northeast England.

Capture Power is a consortium formed by Alstom S.A. (ENX:ALO) (Paris, France), Drax Group plc (LSE:DRX) (Selby, England) and BOC. It plans to capture emissions on the Drax coal power station site. The group aims to form another CCS cluster, and capture emissions from a 436-MW oxy-fired project in Selby, North Yorkshire.

A third cluster, the Don Valley CCS project, which is based around a 650-MW IGCC power station in Yorkshire, is also expected to announce its intention to participate. The developers of this project are 2Co Energy, National Grid and Samsung, who last month took a 15% stake in the company. For additional information, see April 2, 2012, article - Samsung Joins U.K. Carbon Capture Competition.

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