Power Generation

North east England bids to become carbon capture hub

The north east of England launched a bid yesterday to become a hub for the development of carbon capture and storage.

The region currently employs an estimated 26,000 staff across the region in chemical and process industries, which are a major target for CCS technologies.

Regional development agency One North East has put together a prospectus outlining the feasibility of creating a CCS cluster in the region in a bid to encourage new investment.

The plans include Progressive Energy’s proposed CCS-enabled 850MW Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) power plant at Eston Grange in the Tees Valley and the conversion of one of three 140 MW generating units at an existing Rio Tinto Alcon plant at Lynemouth, Northumberland.

The two projects could capture up to 7.5 million tonnes of CO₂ per year and could be operational by 2015.

The CO₂ would be piped to a large permanent storage site in the North Sea or used for enhanced recovery in North Sea oilfields.
Developing a cluster in the region would bring the potential to expand operations to at least 15 million tonnes of CO₂ per year.

“The development of a CCS cluster in the north east could protect thousands of jobs, as well as giving the region a longer-term, sustainable solution for energy-intensive industries,” says One North East chief executive Alan Clarke.

“There remains a significant amount of work to complete so that we are in a position to progress this project further, but this work is now being accelerated,” he adds.

The project will be one of the priorities of the £60 million Tees Valley Industrial Programme (TVIP) announced by the UK Government and One North East last December that aims to support the region’s transition to low-carbon and advanced manufacturing.

For further information:
www.onenortheast.co.uk
www.progressive-energy.com/

04 February 2010

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