Page 14 - EurOil Week 29 2021

EurOil ENERGY TRANSITION EurOil

SOCAR eyes Caspian Sea

wind turbines

AZERBAIJAN AZERBAIJAN’S SOCAR is looking at deploy- wind power in the Caspian would help reduce
ing wind turbines in the Caspian Sea, in a move them.
SOCAR is looking to that would help the state-owned oil and gas pro- “The energy efficiency is in focus for many
reduce its methane ducer reduce the emissions from its oil and gas energy companies and is an important part of
emissions and make its production. SOCAR’s strategic plans,” SOCAR President
gas more attractive to SOCAR said it had entered into a co-oper- Rovnag Abdullayev said in a statement. “In line
buyers. ation pact with French services group Technip with the development trends of technology,
Energies, under which the pair will study the we are already entering this area. Our goal is
construction of floating wind turbines to gener- to reduce operating costs, increase energy effi-
ate power for rigs in Azerbaijan’s portion of the ciency and ensure the sustainability of opera-
Caspian Sea. The partnership could lead to the tions at SOCAR.”
development of the country’s first offshore wind SOCAR, BP and the other partners at TAP
farm. are weighing up whether to double the pipeline’s
The announcement comes as SOCAR and capacity to 20bn cubic metres per year, or opt for
its investment partners seek to generate more a smaller-scale expansion. Increasing the pipe-
interest in Azeri gas in Europe ahead of market line’s capacity would enable more gas to flow
tests this month on a potential expansion of the from the BP-operated Shah Deniz field in the
Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), which would Azeri Caspian. SOCAR has a 16.7% stake in the
enable more supplies from the country to reach upstream project. It is also a partner at Azerbai-
the continent's south-east. Gas customers and jan’s flagship offshore Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli
investors are increasingly assessing suppliers (ACG) project, which ships crude oil to interna-
based on their Scope 1 and 2 emissions, and tional markets, and a number of other offshore
replacing gas-fired generators on board rigs with fields. ™

ExxonMobil signs up to Scottish CCS project

SCOTLAND EXXONMOBIL has signed a preliminary deal (FID), but hope to launch the facility in the
to join the Acorn carbon capture and storage mid-2020s.
CCS is one of the (CCS) project in Scotland, the US oil major The project will use existing oil and gas
most important announced on June 16. infrastructure to transport, inject and trap CO2
technologies needed to Under a memorandum of understanding under the North Sea bed, and it will also produce
achieve climate goals, (MoU) it has signed, ExxonMobil will become blue hydrogen from gas arriving from offshore
ExxonMobil says. a customer of the planned facility, which at full fields, providing industry with another option
capacity is expected to store 5-6mn tonnes per for decarbonisation.
year (tpy) of CO2 under the bed of the North The Acorn partners lined up another poten-
Sea. The CO2 would come from its SEGAL gas tial customer earlier this month – UK chemicals
terminal it operates in St Fergus in partnership producer Ineos. Ineos and its Petroineos joint
with Royal Dutch Shell. venture with China’s PetroChina have signed a
ExxonMobil described CCS as “one of the memorandum on using the facility to store CO2
most important technologies required to achieve from their refining and chemicals complex in
society’s climate goals,” adding that it had joined Grangemouth in the future.
NECCUS, an alliance of industry, government Ineos estimates that it has already low-
and academic experts committed to reducing ered CO2 emissions at Grangemouth by 37%
CO2 emissions from Scottish industry. since buying the facilities in 2005, and with
ExxonMobil is seeking a leadership role in the help of CCS, it expects the reduction to
CCS globally. Earlier this year it pitched the idea reach 50%.
of a $100bn CCS facility on the Gulf coast that “Once operation, the carbon capture and
would capture and permanently store around storage system will provide an essential route to
50mn tonnes of CO2 annually by 2030 and up to permanently and safely capture and store CO2
100mn tpy by 2040. emissions for large industrial emitters through-
Clean energy developer Storegga brought on out Scotland with a significant positive impact
board Shell and Harbour Energy as equal-equity for climate change and the country,” Ineos
partners at the Acorn CCS project in April. The Grangemouth chairman Andrew Gardner com-
group are yet to take a final investment decision mented in a statement. ™

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