Statoil digs into CCS possibilities in Norway

Fossil fuel giant Statoil will carry out feasibility studies for carbon capture and storage (CCS) at three locations on the Norwegian Continental Shelf, the firm revealed this week.


The company announced on Monday (4 January) that it was the only tender for a research contract put out by the Norwegian government. Statoil said the project – which has a budget of around $4m – would be completed by 1 June, 2016.

The oil and gas major described the project as an important step in realising the Norwegian government’s ambition of developing a full-scale CCS project.

Norway’s minister of petroleum and energy Tord Tien said: “CCS will be an important measure in order to mitigate climate change and meet the emission targets under the Paris Agreement.

“We are pleased that we have reached an agreement with Statoil on conducting a feasibility study regarding CO2 storage. After nearly 20 years of experience with such storage from the Sleipner field, Statoil is well equipped for conducting these studies”.

Developing technology

CCS – which involves piping emissions to underground and subsea stores – is widely seen as an important tool in limiting global warming to 2C. The International Energy Agency (IEA) has said that CCS technologies must capture four billion tonnes of CO2 by 2040 to reach climate change targets.

However, according to a November report from the Global CCS Institute, global CCS schemes will store and capture just 40 million tonnes of CO2 a year by 2017, when 22 projects will be online.

In the UK, the technology appears to have been put on the backburner, after the Government axed a £1bn fund for the development of CCS back in November.

Manufacturers’ group EEF called the decision extremely disappointing, claiming that CCS could halve the costs of decarbonising the UK economy by 2050, saving up to £32bn a year.

An EEF spokesperson said CCS was the only option available for cutting emissions in heavy industry such as steel and cement.

Brad Allen

 

 

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