Category Archives: CCS

Shell says must explain CO2 storage better

Oil giant Shell says that it is working to explain to Canadians that underground carbon storage is safe, following rejection in the Netherlands. (Reuters)

There is no value in this nonsense.

REPORT: DIRECT REMOVAL OF CARBON DIOXIDE FROM AIR LIKELY NOT VIABLE

Technologies for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere are unlikely to offer an economically feasible way to slow human-driven climate change for several decades, according to a report issued by the American Physical Society and led by Princeton engineer Robert Socolow. (Princeton)

APS Releases New Technical Assessment: Direct Air Capture of CO2 with Chemicals

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CCS Demos Grinding to a Halt

… However, globally there are now fewer than half a dozen full-scale CCS projects in operation around the world. There were as many as 235 proposed CCS projects globally, 45 of them full-scale. Now there is one in the US (Wyoming), two in Norway, one in the Netherlands, one in Canada, and one in Algeria. All but one of these capture carbon from natural gas, which has only about half the greenhouse gas emissions of coal – because that is easier and cheaper to do. Coal is where the greatest need is.

But with the collapse of climate legislation that would have put a compulsory cap on carbon, polluter-pays funding for potential projects is now non existent in the US. Most of the eight or nine projects under way in the United States are now in doubt, says Howard Herzog, who researches sequestration at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge.

“A lot of the momentum that has been built up is just going to grind to a halt,” he says. “My hope is that we will see a few projects go ahead and serve as an example of what can be done when the politics turn around.” (Clean Technica)

Actually I think it is possibly the world’s dumbest activity:

Germany Squanders Chance to Pioneer CO2 Capture Technology
By Alexander Jung

German scientists and industry had been hoping that carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology could help the transition to a low-carbon future. But a new bill drawn up by the German government has put the brakes on the technology before it was even properly tested.

It’s an unusual drilling facility that stands on the outskirts of Ketzin, a town in the eastern German state of Brandenburg. Instead of pumping something out of the ground, it is forcing something into the earth.

That something is carbon dioxide. The scientists with the Potsdam-based German Research Center for Geosciences are injecting the gas into porous sandstone 650 meters (2,100 feet) beneath the surface. “We are making excellent progress,” says project director Michael Kühn, adding that their efforts have been “very successful.” (Reuters)

The Nuclear Effect on Carbon Capture Plans
Fukushima could speed up the quest to scrub CO2 from fossil fuel

By Alessandra Migliaccio and Jeremy van Loon

As the Fukushima crisis throws a question mark over nuclear energy use, many European countries are trying to accelerate the development of technology that cleans carbon dioxide emissions from conventional fuel plants. “The use of coal in some countries like China and India is actually growing,” European Union Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger said at the Mar. 1 inauguration of a carbon capture project in Italy. “If we can prove that this technology is safe and reliable, we will have a product that we can export in countries where coal production remains key.”

Nuclear energy, which offers homegrown low-carbon power to nations that use it, took a blow from Fukushima, especially in Europe. Germany halted 25 percent of its nuclear capacity and may close its oldest plants permanently after the Green party surged in Mar. 27 state elections. Switzerland shelved plans for new reactors, the U.K. said it may delay plans, and Italy is holding off on its newly launched nuclear program.

Any lost generation is likely to be made up with natural-gas-fired plants, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF), but the trend also lends urgency to projects seeking to extract carbon emissions from fuel combustion and lock it deep underground. (Bloomberg)

Levy for carbon capture projects dropped

Consumers will no longer face the prospect of a new levy on their bills to raise billions of pounds for “carbon capture and storage” projects under a decision set to be announced on Budget day.

Ministers are keen for Britain to become a world leader in the fledgling technology, which involves capturing carbon dioxide from fossil fuel power plants and burying it in caverns deep underground.

In last autumn’s spending review the government announced it had set aside £1bn for at least one CCS pilot scheme, saying it would use either a levy on bills or public money to fund at least three further projects in the future – at the cost of another £3bn. The decision would be made by the spring, it said.

A levy has now been ruled out, according to several sources, as the coalition shies away from imposing fresh costs on the British public at a time of severe austerity. (Financial Times)

See our climate features page for items on why CCS is a horrendously expensive waste of effort and energy.