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Taylor welcomed the announcement, telling the In Mexico, the Energy Ministry suggested in
Sydney Morning Herald that work on the CCS its 2014 “Technology Roadmap on CCS” that
methodology was “progressing rapidly”. He the government establish a national CCS strat-
added: “Australia has a comparative advantage egy and inventory, as well as a centre for techno-
in CCS with a number of large geological storage logical research, development and testing. Since
basins. Successful trials like this are important to then, it has updated the report, identified a num-
the development of CCS in Australia, which will ber of research priorities and proposed several
create jobs and lower emissions.” exploratory projects.
Nevertheless, the country has not taken
Middle East much in the way of action since the 2018 presi-
Qatar is the world’s biggest LNG exporter and dential election. Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador,
like some of its US rivals, it too is looking to the populist candidate who won that vote, has
sequester CO2 at its export facilities. The gov- shelved CCS initiatives, arguing that the Mexi-
ernment revealed in October last year it had a can government does not have the funds needed
plant in operation capable of capturing some to pursue such projects.
2.1mn tpy of CO2. It aims to ramp up the plant’s Meanwhile, Brazil’s national oil company
capacity to 5mn tpy by 2024 and 7mn tpy by (NOC) Petrobras is looking for ways to integrate
2027, hailing the project as the largest CCS CCS into its upstream operations. To this end, it
has launched Latin America’s only operational
investment in the Middle East and North Africa. coast of Rio de Janeiro. These facilities, located “
Enhanced oil recovery (EOR) is also at the CCS scheme: a group of pilot facilities off the South Africa
forefront of the Middle East’s carbon, capture,
utilisation and storage (CCUS) push, with the aboard four floating production, storage and has been one
circular carbon economy firmly in the sights of off-loading (FPSO) vessels, capture and inject of the key players
NOCs Saudi Aramco and ADNOC. CO2 into three oilfields in the offshore Santos
Aramco has been working on CO2-based basin. The CCS project has been in operation in CCS initiatives
EOR at the ‘Uthmaniyah field in Eastern Prov- since 2013 and has already injected 10mn tonnes
ince. This received a boost from the recent pilot of CO2 into the fields. Petrobras hopes to bring in Africa
project launched with Japan’s Institute of Energy the total up to 40mn tonnes by 2025.
Economics to generate blue ammonia from The NOC also serves as the head of the Bra-
hydrogen produced from hydrocarbons, with zilian CCS Network, which published a CO2
the resultant CO2 being split between the Jubail storage atlas for the country in 2015. The net-
Methanol plant and EOR at ‘Uthmaniyah. work has also started work on at least 20 CCS
Meanwhile, ADNOC last week agreed a research projects with the goal of supporting
deal with French super-major Total to explore innovations in the capture, transport and stor-
opportunities in emissions reductions and age of CO2.levels.
CCUS. The Emirati firm has plans to cut green-
house gas (GHG) intensity by 25% by 2030, South Africa
while its 800,000 tpy Al Reyadah CCUS facility South Africa has been one of the key players in
is expected to grow rapidly with a target in place CCS initiatives in Africa. Its government estab-
to capture 5mn tpy of CO2 by the same date. lished the South African Centre for Carbon
Oman has long been leading the pack in Capture & Storage (SACCCS) as a division of
terms of EOR and the Sultanate is also develop- the state-owned South African National Energy
ing a commercial-scale hydrogen facility at the Development Institute (SANEDI), in 2009. In
port of Duqm as Muscat seeks to diversify its turn, SANEDI became a member of the Global
economy away from oil and gas. CCS Institute in 2019.
To the north, however, flaring remains To date, SACCCS and SANEDI have mostly
commonplace in Iraq, though initiatives are focused on investigation of the technical feasi-
ramping up to monetise gas and reduce emis- bility of proposed CO2 storage options. How-
sions. Meanwhile, it is worth noting that cer- ever, they have also launched a Pilot Monitoring
tain international operators developing assets Project (PMP) to build capacity for CO2 mon-
in the Kurdistan Region of northern Iraq have itoring, in line with the CCS Roadmap strategy
reported less than 8kg of CO2 equivalent per document adopted by the South African cabinet
barrel of oil equivalent (kgCO2e/boe), far below in 2012, and it is due to be followed with a car-
some of the region’s top producers. Aramco, for bon capture pilot plant (CCPP), for which the
example, last year reported an upstream carbon World Bank will provide a technical assessment.
intensity of 10.1 kgCO2e/boe. South Africa’s interest in CCS is not limited
to the public sector. Sasol, which is the country’s
Latin America biggest corporate taxpayer, rolled out a new
Efforts to develop CCS capacity are at a relatively 10-year carbon transformation plan just last
early stage in Latin America. The two countries week. The company – which happens to be the
in the region that show the most promise on operator one of the world’s largest individual
this front are Mexico and Brazil, which have sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions,
estimated CO2 storage potential of 100bn the Secunda coal-to-liquids (CTL) plant – is
tonnes and 4 trillion tonnes respectively. Both currently in the first phase of its carbon trans-
have explored their options and have launched formation campaign. This plan aims to cut the
a number of pilot projects, but Brazil has made company’s CO2 emissions by 10% on 2017 base-
more progress. line levels by 2030. ™

P8 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 46 18•November•2020