 | ||
 | | |
 | ||
| | |
 | ||||||||||||||
|  |  | |  | |  | |  | |  | | |||
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
 | ||||||||
Dutch IGCC pioneers chalk up pain and gain Emergency response is behind schedule in the European public sector A new refining industry in Europe's Asian Corridor Commission proposes milestone energy proposal Replace fuel oil with distillate? Cancelled projects will sustain margins “Marine distillate not fuel oil from 2010” Branson's biofuels megastore You heard it here first: refinery CO2 storage a reality in Norway Buncefield 2: Investigation critical Where now for Swedish Class 1 diesel My slow awakening to climate change The luckiest motorist alive Safety row goes on over Europe's largest LNG terminal New WHO guidelines on city air quality put focus on diesel Would LNG really 'evaporate harmlessly' in an accident? Another lesson in the thermobaric bomb Spare a thought for the oil-rich But will the good times keep on rolling? Carbon storage and the zero emissions refinery Everything just changed E85 and high octane gasolines The problem of small-minded young engineers New Permit Regulations Biodiesel newbuilds and a new green superfuel Spilled wine and our split industry Drilling down into the prospects for IGCC The beginning of the start of the end of oil | You heard it here first: Refinery CO2 storage a reality Last year I said that the next refinery constructions in Europe or the US would only get the go-ahead if they included plans to capture and store CO2. I played it just a bit safe by restricting my prediction to new-builds, where the regulatory hurdles are highest. I needn't have. Last Friday (as I write), the first demand from a regulator to a refiner to capture and store CO2 landed on a desk across the border in Norway. To my knowledge, this is the first time this has ever happened. The refiner is Statoil. Its 10m tonne refinery near Bergen, in which Shell also has a 21% stake, wants to improve energy efficiency. Positioned on the coast close to the gas and oil fields of a resource-rich nation, it's perhaps understandable that it hasn't placed the emphasis on energy utilisation that other refiners in the region have. Now an imaginative 630MW project would supply an unusual electrically powered gas platform in the North Sea while providing heat to the refinery. But, while the Norwegian Water Resources and Energy Directorate gave a new combined heat and power (CHP) plant the green light. The Norwegian Pollution Control Authority signalled red. Statoil's Vice President Manufacturing, Egil Sael, takes up the story. "The project involves taking excess refinery gas as well as some natural gas from the Troll gas field to a CHP," says Mr Sael. "Supplying the refinery with heat and power and the North Sea's only electrically powered gas platform with power meant we could expect excellent energy efficiency – 70%, gradually increasing to 80%." With a company policy to reduce CO2 emissions and any refiner's urge to be higher up the efficiency rankings, the company felt it had a strong environmental case for the project. But now, he says, the project hangs in the balance. The Pollution Control Authority, part of the Ministry of Environment in Norway, is proposing to the Ministry that the project capture its CO2 from the very first day of operation. "If we have to pay for CO2 capture and storage then this project will be completely unfeasible. We'll be sorry, but we'll have to drop it," says Mr Sael. The government will now decide. Some might think that the political decision was a no-brainer. But think again, this is Norway – Europe's leading proponent of carbon sequestration and a country where in 2000 a Prime Minister resigned over the issue of CO2-free power generation. Indeed the earlier consent given by the water and energy authority was subject to the plant being CO2 capture-ready, that is, ready to capture CO2 at a later stage if a value chain should be established. Statoil itself was disheartened, but not entirely surprised, to find itself in this position. The Socialist/Social Democrat and Green government has already said that no new gas-fired power station will be built in the country without the CO2 being stored underground. The new CHP will emit of 1.3m tpy of CO2 – the equivalent of 325,000 hot air balloons full. But integration with the refinery means a net emission of 900,000 tpy. Statoil says the requirement to sequestrate from day one would mean setting about a major project when there is no proven technology at a reasonable cost available to accomplish a successful outcome. It fears the costs will be a black hole. Neither is a business case established yet demonstrating that the CO2 could be used for enhanced oil recovery on the Norwegian continental shelf outside Mongstad. But the Norwegian government may well argue that it is taking steps to help companies address the financial risks they will encounter as they set about addressing the climate change impacts of their business. Bjørn-Erik Haugan is Executive Director of the state-funded Centre for Gas Power Technology, Gassnova. “Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a very high profile issue in Norway and we are in a position to be an early entrant into the CCS market,” he says. His agency has joined industry partners in funding Det Norske Veritas(DNV) in a US $600,000 project to provide rapid qualification of CO2 technologies. Norway is well-placed, he says, because Enhanced Oil Recovery options can provide a financial kick-start not available in other countries. A saline sand formation in the North Sea, currently being injected with CO2 from Statoil’s Sleipner field, is capable of storing CO2 from the whole of Europe for many tens of years to come. But time is short. Even the rewards of EOR will not, on their own, stimulate the industry sufficiently for the challenge of climate change, he suggests. Energy consumption (80% of it fossil fuel) is expected to rise by 60% by 2030, a time when the world will need to have made significant progress towards reducing greenhouse gas emissions by the 70-80% reduction target for 2050. DNV Research Programme Director, Dr Ståle Selmer-Olsen, says their project will help address that challenge by assisting the oil and gas industry with an old problem of its own. “According to research by McKinsey at the end of the 1990s, it takes the oil and gas industry a very long time – 20 years on average – to get an idea from an engineer’s desk into commercial application,” says Dr Selmer-Olsen. Since then DNV has been experimenting with how to proactively engage with technology development so as to provide early verification and qualification of the reliability, efficiency and HSE aspects. “Many decision makers avoid good ideas because this takes them into new territory where there is higher risk and uncertain cost implications,” he says. “But now there is great demand for developing CO2 free power plants at affordable costs and we need to speed up the development of technology and foster trust in stakeholders.” DNV has played a leading role in the EU Emissions Trading System and other climate change projects and, says Dr Selmer-Olsen: “For DNV it is essential to ensure that CCS becomes a safe, reliable and cost efficient GHG mitigation option based on best practise standards, best available technologies (BAT) and internationally accepted frameworks for climate change.” While Statoil is concerned about the viability of its Mongstad Refinery project, it should be said that the company is engaged with Shell in the world’s largest CO2 capture project at Tjeldbergodden. This onshore gas power station is at the feasibility study stage, with a decision to execute due in 2008, says Statoil’s Egil Sael. | |||||||
Download Energy Industry Resumé with work samples Profile: Tim Lloyd Wright MA Here you'll find a brief profile of my work with international energy, transport and associated environmental issues. Energy trends articles You heard it here first: refinery CO2 storage a reality in Norway From the archive... Over-processed fuel leaves oil tankers adrift | ||||||||
| | | | | | | | |
