UKCCSC News 20th Sept 2007

Hi Folks,

It was good to see familiar faces at the meeting in Newcastle earlier in the week. Excellent results are now coming out of the project, which is great.

A quick reminder that you can send your outputs from the project to me for posting on the UKCCSC web-site.

There’s plenty of news this month, with the various political parties falling over themselves to go green in the conference season. But first, some University news that won’t be new to our colleagues in Nottingham…

1) Midlands consortium wins battle for new hi-tech institute Headquarters for a new hi-tech institute will be set up at Loughborough University to help the UK reduce its carbon footprint. Science and Innovation Minister, Ian Pearson, announced today that Loughborough will host the new Energy Technologies Institute (ETI), as part of a Midlands Consortium. Together with Nottingham and Birmingham Universities it will work on bringing more focus, ambition and collaboration to the UK's work of science.

 http://www.gnn.gov.uk/content/detail.asp?ReleaseID=316118&NewsAreaID=142&NavigatedFromSearch=True

2) Will UK fund three CCS plant in competition? Mail on Sunday 2 Sept 2007

You presumably know about the forthcoming UK Government attempt to promote CCS through a competition for a single source-to-sink power scheme. Officially, there will be only a single winning entry, but there has been speculation that subsidising 3 entries might be possible.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/investing-and-markets/article.html?in_article_id=423906&in_page_id=3

3) Emissions reduction programme for Amec using CCS Sep 12 2007 by Iain Laing, The Journal

ENGINEERING giant Amec has won a contract to create a revolutionary carbon dioxide network which could help reduce UK emissions by millions of tonnes a year. The company has been awarded the contract to prepare a study to investigate the technical and economic feasibility of creating a distributed CO2 network within the Yorkshire and Humber region.

The £100,000 contract was awarded by development agency Yorkshire Forward. Financial support is being provided by BP, ConocoPhillips, Drax Power, E.ON, Powerfuels, Scottish and Southern and Shell.

 http://www.nebusiness.co.uk/business-news/latest-business-news/2007/09/12/emissions-reduction-programme-for-amec-51140-19776186/

4) There are lies, damned lies and political manifestos … ‘Tories plan to fight climate change with taxes and green tape’ Friday September 14, 2007, The Guardian

“Climate change · Set a target for carbon dioxide emissions focused on ensuring global temperatures rise no more than 2C above pre-industrial levels. This means the UK must plan for an 80% cut in global emissions by 2050, higher than current government targets. Energy

· No new coal power stations after 2020 without carbon capture and storage. Existing stations will have until 2025 to introduce the technology.

· No taxpayer/government funding for nuclear fission, risks and costs of nuclear borne by the private sector. But new carbon price in ETS will make nuclear more competitive.

· Withdraw subsidy for onshore wind farms.” You can download the whole policy document (549 pages, riveting reading). Hannah Chalmers, who drew my attention to this, commented that it seems to be lacking some understanding of what really needs to be done immediately. I’m afraid that the same criticism could be made of the other parties too.

Blue Print for a Green Economy (UK Conservative Party): http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=news.story.page&obj_id=138484

5) CCS given Kyoto green light

“The capture and sequestering underground of carbon dioxide from coal-fired power plants will earn carbon credits under the Kyoto Protocol, following amendments to the treaty’s main carbon trading scheme. A UNFCCC official said approval has been given for so-called carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects to claim CER credits under Kyoto’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), Reuters reports. Jose Miguez, a member of the CDM Executive Board, said the CDM would be expanded to cover some specific CCS activities in the upcoming first Kyoto commitment period to 2012.

Projects would only be eligible in developing countries where at least half the nation’s electricity is generated from burning coal.”

Just to remind you that you mustn’t believe everything you read in print, this comes from the same article:

“[CCS] Trials are underway in a number of countries including Norway, Scotland…” Really?

http://www.carbonpositive.net/viewarticle.aspx?articleID=832

6) Oh, and the Lib-Dems want to ban all petrol driven cars from the road from 2040. I’m slightly suspicious that is partly driven by the myth that electric cars are emissions-free. They are, provided that the electricity you charge the battery with comes from an emission-free source. Still, at least I won’t get to breath exhaust fumes while commuting to work on my bike.

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article2973537.ece