Vattenfall to build Euro1bn carbon capture plant

Stockholm - Swedish energy group Vattenfall is investing around one billion euros to build a demonstration plant for carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology at one of the 500 MW blocks of the conventional lignite power plant Jänschwalde in the State of Brandenburg, Germany. The facility is scheduled to be in full-scale operation no later than 2015.

The Jänschwalde lignite power plant comprises six 500 MW blocks. For the demo plant, one of the blocks, consisting of two boilers, will be equipped with CCS. One boiler will be newly built with Oxy-fuel technology; another one will be retrofitted with Post-combustion technology.

“Fossil fuels can be high-tech, and do have a great future. The emission problem can be solved, and by solving it Vattenfall will establish itself once again as a technological leader in terms of CCS,” said Tuomo Hatakka, CEO of Vattenfall Europe.

The world’s first pilot plant for CO2-seperation will be inaugurated by Vattenfall in Schwarze Pumpe, Brandenburg, this summer. This pilot will have an installed capacity of 30 Megawatt (thermal) and aims to optimise the Oxy-fuel process, which has been successfully tested on a laboratory scale. Vattenfall is investing about 70 million euros to build this pilot plant.

“After the inauguration of a CCS pilot plant this summer, a demonstration plant on industrial scale level is the consistent next step. In this way Vattenfall takes responsibility to combat climate change, while ensuring secure supply of electricity and heat from Germany’s most important domestic fuel, lignite. Furthermore, we are on the way of reaching our target to halve the company’s CO2-emissions by 2030,” says Tuomo Hatakka.

To compensate the loss of efficiency in the generation process, incurred by the installation of additional components, Vattenfall is developing methods for increasing efficiency and operational excellence. Vattenfall is cooperating with Gaz de France Production and Exploration GmbH in order to test a technology for storing the captured CO2 in a depleted natural gas field in the Altmark.