How to deploy CCS

CCS technology is available, but due to high costs there are no large power plants or factories that have installed full-scale CCS technology yet. The challenges for ensuring that CCS becomes a natural part of facilities with large CO2 emissions are many. The technology must be demonstrated in full-scale, the costs of technology must be reduced and funding mechanisms for the first projects must be established, technological improvements must be made and regulations must be put into effect.

Research activities on CCS has been ongoing for years with good results, and scientists and industry agree that the next logical step for further improving the technology is to build large-scale demonstration projects.

There are many small pilot plants worldwide for CCS, but most of these plants only capture CO₂ without storing it. In addition, there are some pilot projects on storage of CO₂, but without capture, which is an essential part of the CCS concept.

The existing pilots either capture or store CO₂ in a range of up to thousands of tonnes of CO₂ per year. The challenge is now to build large-scale CCS projects that include capture, transport, and storage of CO₂ in the range of hundreds of thousads to millions of tonnes of CO₂ per year.

The good news is that there are many planned CCS demonstration projects worldwide. Yet it remains to be seen how many of these initiatives that will go further to the building phase. Many projects will most likely be built as there are promising signals from politicians and industri to fund the projects. In fact, the G8 leaders have recommended construction of 20 CCS demonstration projects worldwide, and the EU has planned to build 10-12 CCS demonstration plants by 2015.

Read more on CCS demonstration programs

The first large-scale projects are always expensive when new technology is intrduced. This is also the case for CCS. The costs of the first projects are estimated from 0.5 to 1.1 billion euros [1]. This is far more expensive that the industry is willing to invest. The costs of building CCS demonstration projects must therefore be shared between industry and public funding mechanisms.

There is growing interest from politicians to establish public funding for CCS demonstration projects. Funding mechanisms were established in late 2008 in the EU which will use the income from the sale of CO2 emission allowances to fund the first CCS plants. The EU has earmarked the income from 300 million emission allowances for this purpose. With an expected price of 30 euro per allowance, the total budget for building CCS demonstration projects could be 9 billion euros.

The challenge is to establish public funding to ensure the building of CCS demonstration projects throughout the world. Possible funding mechanisms range from national budgets to the World Bank.

Furthermore, including CCS in the CDM mechansim of the Kyoto protocol could spur investment in CCS projects. But even more important is the post 2012 international climate agreement to be negotiated at the UNFCCC meeting in Copenhagen in December 2009. If CCS is included in emission reduction mechansims in this agreement it could ensure large investments in CCS.

CCS is still a rather new technology so there is great potential for technological improvement. R&D programmes that address the challenges are underway globally, and large improvements can be expected in the years to come.

When capturing CO₂ large quantities of energy are required to run the capture plant. Using today's technology, if a CO₂ capture plant was added to a coal power plant, approximately 15 percent of the energy produced by the power plant would be consumed by the CO₂ capture plant. R&D activities to find new and improved solvents (chemicals) are expected to reduce this energy penalty. By the time the first CCS demonstration plants are in operation in 2015, the energy required for CCS is expected to be ~10 percent of the energy produced by the power plant [1].

Read more on technology challenges

Ensuring safe storage is essential. Today there are a few large-scale CO₂ storage projects. The first one, the Sleipner project in the Nort Sea, was started in 1996 and is still in operation. Close to 1 million tonne CO₂ has been stored annually, and there are no indications of leakages. Over a decade of safe storage at Utsira proves that it is possible to ensure safe CO₂ storage.

However, there are challenges related to CO₂ storage. There are many possible storage sites worldwide, but each site must be carefully characterised before safe CO₂ storage can be guaranteed. This process requires comprehensive geological surveys as well as international standards for how to characterise storage sites which are not yet established. Models that predict how the CO₂ behaves after it is injected underground must also be developed.

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A transparent regulatory framework for CCS is necessary to ensure that there are guidelines for how CCS should be conducted. A few years ago the absence of regulations was regarded as a bottleneck for CCS deployment, but these issues are now being resolved.

In 2006, Australia was the first country to implement regulations and guidelines for CCS. The EU followed suit in 2008 with a new directive for CO₂ storage.

International regulations have also been changed to permit CO₂ storage. The most important ones are the OSPAR Convention and the London Protocol which originally were established to protect the marine and the subterranean environment. This regulations have been amended to allow CO₂ storage. However, some minor issues are still unresolved.

Public worldwide awareness of CCS is low which can be a serious obstacle for further development of CCS.

There are many people who have never heard of CCS, and people tend to be skeptical to new ideas that they have never heard about. When the public is asked what they think about CCS, a lot of people reply that it is a bad idea. But if you give them objective information about CCS and then ask once again how they regard the concept, the response is much more positive.

Many people fear that storage of CO₂ is dangerous, but very often their concern is due to lack of information.

Information campaigns that provide the public with relevant information on CCS must be conducted. Governmental bodies should work together with industry and NGOs to provide the public with relevant information that is easily understandable.

So when will CCS be a reality? When will new factories and coal power plants be built with CCS?

The easy answer is that it will happen as soon as CCS becomes less expensive than emitting CO₂.

The European plattform of CCS experts (ZEP) says that CCS could be commercially available in 2020 [2]. This is ambitious, but possible if the following road map is followed:

1. Planning and designing of CCS demonstration projects must start now.
2. CCS demonstration projects should be in operation worldwide by 2015.
3. By 2020 CCS costs should be equal to the price of emitting CCS. From 2020 and onwards new fossil fuel power plants and industrial factories will be required to build with CCS. Furthermore, already existing facilities will be retrofitted with CCS.
4. In 2050 there will be thousands of coal and gas power plants and factories with CCS. This could reduce by about half of the global CO₂ emissions compared to a business-as-usual scenario.

• Bellona Paper on funding mechanisms
• Technology challenges
• CCS demonstration programs
• Oxyfuel with CO₂ capture
• Storage safety

1. Carbon Capture & Storage: Assessing the Economics McKinsey & Company. 2008
2. EU Demonstration Programme for CCS - ZEP' proposal ZEP. 2008

ZEP