UKCCSC News 25 October 2007

Hi Folks

Here’s another stockpile of storage snippets, making October a record month. The first article will be music to the ears of many UKCCSC members:

1) “Lighting the way: leading scientists sketch roadmap for sustainable energy”

“Some of the world's leading scientists have set out a roadmap for achieving sustainable energy, making recommendations in the areas of carbon capture and storage, nuclear energy and biofuels, and emphasising the role of scientists in finding solutions.”

“Technologies for capturing and sequestering carbon fossil fuels, particularly coal, can play a major role in the cost-effective management of global carbon dioxide emissions, according to the report. It highlights however that without policy intervention, 'the vast majority of the coal-fired power plants constructed in the next two decades will be conventional, pulverised coal plants'. Present technologies for capturing carbon dioxide emissions from pulverised coal plants on a retrofit basis are expensive and energy intensive.

The panel recommends that where new coal plants without capture must be constructed, the most efficient technologies should be used. In addition, minimising the costs of future retrofits for carbon capture should become a priority. This could be tackled by developing at least some elements of carbon capture technology at every new plant. The report also recommends aggressive moves to commercialise carbon capture and storage, and further study of potential retrofit technologies for post-combustion carbon capture at existing pulverised coal plants.”

http://cordis.europa.eu/fetch?CALLER=EN_NEWS&ACTION=D&SESSION=&RCN=28560

Or try Scientific American:

“But the "cornerstone" of any sustainable energy future, according to panel member Ged Davis, co-president of global energy assessment at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, will be carbon capture and storage. "We still are a long ways from any sense of commerciality," he says.”

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=CF809E92-E7F2-99DF-386D8796CBC396FF&chanID=sa007

The IAC report itself is at:

http://www.interacademycouncil.net/?id=12161

You can get the whole report in small(-ish) sections, a quick count suggested the whole thing is around 20 Mb. I wonder if there will be a competition to speed-read it, as there was for the last Harry Potter novel?

2) Next, an update on the UK Government’s CCS competition:

“UK Utilities Make Scant Progress On Government CO2 Capture Decision” CNN

U.K. utilities made little progress at a meeting Wednesday [Oct 17th] in convincing the government to reverse the decision to exclude a number of projects from its carbon capture funding project, people present at the meeting said Friday. "We are not going to be able to reverse the decision," said a representative of one of the large utilities present at the meeting. "The competition is travelling down one route, post-combustion capture," said the person.”

http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/djf500/200710191235DOWJONESDJONLINE000682_FORTUNE5.htm

3) “Kyoto treaty has failed, top scientist says” in the Telegraph

“Climate change is the biggest single global challenge we face, Sir David King, the Government's chief scientist warned as critics called for a rethink of the "failed" Kyoto climate treaty. Prof King called for an increase in carbon trading, the transfer of technology - such as carbon capture and storage - to major polluting countries such as China and for more money to be spent on adaptation in countries, including Britain, that will be prone to increased flooding.”

He goes onto suggest that the USA might chose to spend the same amount of cash on Climate Change as it spends on ‘defence’ research. Is that a pig I see flying?

4) The Carbon Capture Legal Programme, aims to provide an authoritative, independent and objective source of up to date legal information on Carbon Capture and Storage.

Professor Richard Macrory and Ray Purdy are editing a special issue of the Journal for European Environmental and Planning Law, which will focus on Carbon Capture and Storage. The issue, due out in the autumn, will provide an in-depth analysis of the various legal issues surrounding CCS, from leading practitioners, consultants and academics in Europe and other jurisdictions.

Try the website for lots of legal info:

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/cclp/

5) “Global plans ‘green’ gas plant in Fife”, Herald

“A plan to construct the UK's largest - and "greenest" - coal gasification plant in Fife will be put into action later this autumn if Global Energy succeeds in a $350m (£172m) initial public offering, announced yesterday.”

“Working with a Toronto-based ecological engineering firm, HTC PureEnergy, Global Energy is redesigning the plant to capture carbon dioxide created in the gasification and trap it in underground storage facilities.”

“Such carbon capture techniques are untried in Scotland, and the company warned potential share buyers that it cannot guarantee that the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency would sign off on the proposed carbon storage arrangements.”

http://www.theherald.co.uk/business/news/display.var.1764645.0.0.php

6) A bit late this one, but better late than never?

“Carbon capture and storage - a climate change solution?

WWF [World Wildlife Fund] welcomes the amendment of the OSPAR Convention to enable the storage of carbon dioxide in the north-east Atlantic. WWF believes that carbon capture and storage (CCS), if properly regulated, could be an important weapon in the battle against climate change. CCS could help to keep global warming below 2°C and help cut global CO2 emissions by more than 50% by mid-century.”

And especially for the Plymouth contingent:

“A UK Marine Act would help ensure proper planning and management for comparatively new technologies such as CCS in the north-east Atlantic. WWF continues to campaign for the inclusion of a Marine Act in this year's Queen Speech.”

http://www.wwf.org.uk/news/n_0000004130.asp

Finally, a story that doesn’t specifically mention CCS, but is of general concern to anyone with an interest in climate, emissions etc

7) “Labour's plan to abandon renewable energy targets” Guardian

“Ministers are planning a U-turn on Britain's pledges to combat climate change that "effectively abolishes" its targets to rapidly expand the use of renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. Leaked documents seen by the Guardian show that Gordon Brown will be advised today that the target Tony Blair signed up to this year for 20% of all European energy to come from renewable sources by 2020 is expensive and faces "severe practical difficulties".”

That’s all folks, ‘till next time. Mark