As the UK and EU work towards achieving ambitious net-zero targets, the development of a robust and interconnected CO2 transport and storage infrastructure has emerged as a critical priority. Chief executive of the Carbon Capture and Storage Association, Ruth Herbert*, sees key challenges and opportunities.
One of the primary talking points at the upcoming CO2 Shipping and Terminals Conference in June, according to Ms Herbert, will be “the link between the UK and the EU and how it can enable a Europe-wide market for CO2 transport and storage.”
While acknowledging that a looming general election in the UK and elections in the European Parliament introduce some uncertainty, she expressed optimism about the potential for technical measures, such as mutual recognition of standards, to facilitate cross-border projects.
Ms Herbert also highlights the European Commission’s industrial carbon management strategy, which outlines a vision for CO2 transport and storage in Europe and emphasises the need for regulation, as a reason for optimism. The Commission’s view that it will be possible to store CO2 in third countries is a positive sign for the development of a Europe-wide market, she adds.
The maritime sector is poised to play a crucial role in the success of the UK’s Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) Vision, particularly in terms of CO2 shipping. The new UK CCUS Vision outlines plans for a competitive carbon capture usage and storage market to drive down costs. Industry has estimated that around £30Bn (US$40Bn) can be invested into the UK CCUS by 2030 if the government accelerates the cluster programme and provides visibility on deployment beyond the track-1 clusters.
Ms Herbert stresses the importance of quickly establishing a shipping network to provide resilience for storage sites and emitters, ensuring there are options for sending CO2 to different locations. “It’s clear from the study we recently did with the Zero Emissions Platform that there’s about 50M tonnes of CO2 across Europe that wants to have a shipped CO2 option by 2030.”
UK ports, in particular, are actively involved in feasibility studies and cluster collaborations, working alongside power producers, fuel producers, carbon capture developers and CO2 storage providers to identify infrastructure requirements, synergies and the most economical ways to provide CO2 transport and storage services. Ms Herbert notes this work is gaining significant momentum, especially in locations in the southeast and southwest of the UK, where shipping is expected to play a key role in the CO2 value chain from the outset.
Addressing the specific needs of the waste to energy and cement industries, which are geographically dispersed and require access to CO2 transport and storage infrastructure, Ms Herbert highlights the importance of ensuring CO2 shipping is an eligible transport route within the allocation of business models. “We’ve had confirmation that will be the case for phase two of the track two competition,” she says, referring to the follow-on clusters in Viking and the Scottish cluster, “but we don’t have a clear timeline for that and this means the UK could lose out on being an early mover in the emerging European CO2 shipping market”.
Ms Herbert also sees the potential for integrating hydrogen production with carbon capture and storage, as exemplified by the HyNet project. By producing hydrogen using carbon capture and storage, the HyNet project aims to create a large, reliable volume of low-carbon hydrogen for use in industrial decarbonisation and fuel switching. “In areas where you’ve got lots of industries that can almost fully decarbonise just using fuel switching, it’s a good solution," Ms Herbert explains, pointing out the need for CO2 transport and storage networks to support both hydrogen production and industrial sites with process emissions.
In terms of the UK government’s approach to creating a competitive CCUS market, Ms Herbert says, "The current business models are the appropriate structure to jumpstart the market and encourage co-ordinated investment in these regions, something that can’t really happen without the government shouldering the risks that would otherwise go unaddressed."
There are ongoing conversations with the government on implementing the CCUS Vision, including looking at how to reduce subsidies over time. “Over the next few months, we plan to initiate these discussions with the government through the agreed-upon work programme for putting the CCUS Vision into action,” she says.
Looking ahead, Ms Herbert emphasised the significance of low-carbon product standards in driving the transformation of markets and economic interests towards technologies like CCUS.
"Low-carbon products are going to be where it’s at going forward in terms of economic growth, and that will drive countries to invest in this decarbonisation infrastructure," she predicts, noting the impact of carbon border adjustment mechanisms (CBAMs) like the one proposed by the EU on countries outside of Europe.
Ms Herbert sees CBAMs as a potentially effective tool to incentivise decarbonisation in countries that trade with the EU. The applicability and replicability of CBAMs in different contexts around the world, however, remains to be seen.
source: rivieramm.com (Edwin Lampert)