Page 12 - NorthAmOil Week 46

NorthAmOil COMMENTARY NorthAmOil

Canada’s Quest CCS
project

NZT and ZCH also comprise sub-projects to significant future emissions solutions, new uti-
produce blue hydrogen from gas arriving from lisation pathways and innovation in the carbon
the North Sea. Similar developments are also capture space,” ACTL operator Wolf Midstream’s
underway in Merseyside in England and St Fer- president of carbon, Jeff Pearson, said in June,
gus in Scotland. There are also preliminary plans after the pipeline came fully online. “The future
to capture CO2 at the Isle of Grain terminal in of energy and a lower-carbon economy relies on
Kent in southern England, and in south Wales. key infrastructure like the ACTL.”
Another key project is Porthos in the Nether- More CCS initiatives are underway in Can-
lands, where gas grid operator Gasunie is leading ada, aided by recently unveiled government
a consortium that aims to store some 2.5mn tpy support at both the federal and provincial lev-
of CO2 in the North Sea from industries in the els. And with Canada increasingly being touted
Rotterdam area. Royal Dutch Shell, ExxonMo- as a potential leader in the development of blue
bil, Air Liquide and Air Products, expected to hydrogen – produced through methane steam
be Porthos’ first customers, signed joint devel- reforming alongside a CCS component to mini-
opment agreements (JDAs) on the scheme in mise emissions – further opportunities for CCS
December last year. developments are expected to arise. However,
Porthos is vying for €102mn ($118mn) in as with all emerging technologies, developers
financial aid from the EU’s Connecting Europe will need to balance costs with local and federal
Facility, and the Dutch government has also emission reduction goals.
pledged to subsidise some of the cost of CCS. South of the border, meanwhile, CCS has
This will be vital, as Porthos estimates that stor- been less visible in the US. However, CCS initia-
age and transport costs alone will come to €30 tives are underway there too – having struggled
per tonne. to gain traction initially because they had been Canada considers
designed with EOR in mind, but came as the
North America shale revolution lowered demand for such tech- itself a leader
Both the US and Canada are seeing a handful of niques. Now, though, the concept of capturing in CCS thanks to
new CCS proposals, with more likely to come CO2 purely for the sake of lowering emissions
as decarbonisation efforts gather momentum. is starting to take off, bolstered by a federal tax existing schemes
However, it will likely be some time before credit introduced in 2018.
any new CCS projects are developed in North For example, at least two proposed LNG pro- that notably
America. jects on the US Gulf Coast include a CCS compo-
Canada considers itself a leader in CCS nent as they try to position themselves as being include the Quest
thanks to existing schemes that notably include the most environmentally friendly projects of project.
the Quest project, which captures and sequesters their kind. Neither NextDecade’s Rio Grande
CO2 from a bitumen upgrader. Another particu- LNG nor G2 Net-Zero LNG’s proposed facility
larly prominent project is the Alberta Carbon have yet reached the FID stage, however. Indeed,
Trunk Line (ACTL) – the largest pipeline in the NextDecade has suggested Rio Grande could
world for CO2 emitted from human activity with reach FID in 2021 if it secures enough offtake
a capacity of up to 14.6mn tpy – which became agreements. G2 Net-Zero LNG, meanwhile, only
fully operational in June. CO2 transported via proposed its LNG terminal – a cleaner redesign
the pipeline is delivered to Central Alberta for of a previous plan – earlier this year and still has
both storage and use in enhanced oil recovery some way to go until the facility can be built.
(EOR). Overall there are around 30 CCS projects
“This critical piece of infrastructure supports under development in the US, according to the

P12 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 46 19•November•2020