More CCS Could be Coming to Lighten Alberta's Heavy Carbon Footprint

Written by Daniel Graeber for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Enbridge Incorporated (NYSE:ENB) (Calgary, Alberta) and cement maker Lehigh Hanson Incorporated (Irving, Texas) signed a memorandum of understanding Wednesday to explore carbon-capture opportunities at a cement manufacturing facility in Alberta, part of an emerging trend in the oil-rich province.

Lehigh said it was developing a carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) facility in North America at its manufacturing facility in Edmonton, Alberta. Subscribers to Industrial Info's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) Metals & Minerals Project Database can click here for a detailed project report.

The cement industry has a heavy carbon footprint, accounting for about 8% of global CO2 emissions.

The partners envision a sequestration capacity of about 780,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year. That CO2 would be sent by pipeline for permanent storage by Enbridge.

Enbridge, for its part, said it would file an application with the provincial government to develop an open-access carbon storage operation just west of Edmonton, dubbed the Open Access Wabamun Carbon Hub.

When combined with Lehigh's facility, the projects could avoid nearly 4 million tons of atmospheric CO2 emissions.

"Lehigh Cement's pioneering CCUS project is an exciting addition to our proposed Open Access Wabamun Carbon Hub, which is poised to support the decarbonization of multiple industries, including power generation, oil and gas, and now cement," said Colin Gruending, a senior official at Enbridge. "This collaboration demonstrates our focus on local, cost-effective, customer-focused carbon transportation and storage solutions that drive scale and competitiveness, while minimizing infrastructure footprint to protect land, water and the environment."

The development is part of an emerging trend in Alberta, which holds the fourth-largest oil reserves in the world, after Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and Iran. Alberta's government said recently it committed to investing more than $1 billion (USD) over the next 15 years to capture emissions from its reserves.

The viscous form of crude oil that dominates Albertan acreage has a heavy carbon footprint. The provincial government reports that oil sands account for 25% of Alberta's annual emissions. To address that, it has tacked on a $30-per-metric-ton price on carbon emissions for the sector and has proposed legislation that would cap permissible emissions.

Elsewhere, the government committed to investing $1.4 billion on two large-scale carbon capture and storage projects: the Alberta Carbon Trunk Line and the so-called Quest Project.

Completed in 2020, the trunk line moves captured carbon through a 150-mile pipeline to end users deploying enhanced oil recovery. Opened in 2018, Quest, operated by Shell plc (NYSE:RDS.A) (The Hague, Netherlands), is permanently storing CO2 underground.

The International Energy Agency said carbon sequestration must be part of the energy transition if there's any hope of reaching net-zero emissions in the global economy.

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