Planned and existing carbon capture and storage sites across Europe highlight growing demand for CO2 shipping (source: International Association of Oil & Gas Producers)
This year’s 6th ' Projects of Common Interest ' (PCI) list – the fourth to include CO2 networks – is of particular interest since it comes after a major revision to the TEN-E regulation in 2022. All PCIs must connect two or more Member States, and the designation ‘Projects of Mutual Interest’ (PMIs) has also been introduced for projects that include non-EU Member States (‘third countries’).
This latest list of candidates represents a substantial increase over to the eight projects which applied to the 5th list, indicative of the growing momentum in Europe for carbon capture and storage as a vital enabler of industrial decarbonisation. Also significant is the much wider geographical reach of the current crop; where plans have previously been confined to the North Sea, we now see interest from the four corners of the continent, spanning from Iceland to Greece, and from Spain to Lithuania.
As far as Greece concerns, two CO2 storage projects promoted to be included in the preliminary list of PCI projects promoting carbon capture and storage (CCS). The first project is implemented by Energean with the support of DESFA.
The first, Prinos project – an investment that can reach 1 billion euros in full development – concerns in the first phase the storage of 0.5-1 million tons of CO2 per year, while in the second phase – towards the end of the decade – the storage capacity could increase to 2.5-3 million CO2 per year. The Prinos terminal is expected to become operational by the end of 2027.
The part of the project that concerns DESFA, has a budget of 470 million euros and is codenamed Apollo CO2 – it concerns the interconnection with a pipeline system of all the industries that are concentrated in the region of Attica, so that the CO2 emissions are transferred to a Liquefaction Unit and from there to be transported by ships to Prinos. As market sources estimate, the two projects have great synergies and can create an integrated value chain for CCS in Greece.
The storage of carbon dioxide in Prinos will allow the reduction of emissions in industries with significant production of gaseous pollutants (e.g. cement industry, metallurgy, power generation, refineries). In view of the further increase in the cost of purchasing carbon dioxide emission rights, which is expected in the coming years, industries will drastically reduce their operating costs.
Finally the second project, RECODE (by TITAN group), includes a specific plan to ship the greenhouse gas, around 200,000 tonnes a year of CO2, from a cement plant in Sicily to Greece, in a way that it can be exploited again, in order to produce cement . This project complies with the PCI restriction of connecting two or more Member States in EU.
PCIs are key enablers of more localised carbon capture projects. The growth in individual projects is highlighted by support issued from the EU Innovation Fund. Under two rounds its has delivered funding to seven projects that include carbon transport by ship. These include the Coda terminal in Iceland, in which Dan-Unity – a CO2 shipping joint venture between Evergas and Ultragas .
As an indication of CO2 shipping costs, Dan-Unity projects that carrying CO2 to the Coda Terminal will range from €24-34 per tonne depending on distance, with an optional premium of €6-9 per tonne if shippers wish to use green ship fuel.
The Commission will publish its list of selected PCIs in November, at around the same time as the EU Innovation Fund plans to release the results of its third call for projects.