Scottish and Southern Energy pushes Ferrybridge CCS project

London - Scottish and Southern Energy (SSE) is seeking consent to develop the UK’s largest carbon-dioxide-capture trial facility at its Ferrybridge coal-fired power station near Castleford in Yorkshire. The £21-million project aims to demonstrate the carbon-dioxide-capture element of carbon-capture and storage (CCS) technology.

According to SSE, trials will be jointly undertaken in 2011-2012 with a consortium of partners, including Renfrew-based steam-generator suppliers, Doosan Babcock, at a facility that will produce 100 tonnes of carbon dioxide per day - equivalent to 5MW of coal-fired power-generating capacity. The project is intended to bridge the gap between lab-scale trials currently underway and the larger-scale projects envisaged by the government, by demonstrating the operational characteristics of a capture plant at a full-scale power station.

"Most people agree that the UK's current portfolio of coal-fired power stations still have a crucial role to play in keeping the country's lights on, but that role will have to alter if climate-change targets are to be met," said Ian Marchant, chief executive of SSE.. "That needs a two-stage policy approach. We agree that no new coal-fired power stations should be built without full carbon-dioxide abatement, but another decision needs to be taken. We believe no coal-fired power stations without full carbon-dioxide abatement should be allowed to operate beyond 2030."

The UK government has decided that all new combustion power stations over 300MW in England and Wales will have to be designed 'carbon-capture ready'. SSE is now urging the government to go a step further by ensuring full, rather than portioned, carbon-dioxide abatement on new coal-fired generation plants.

"This straightforward approach is consistent with security of energy supply and the UK's legally binding carbon-emissions targets, while reflecting the fundamental change in energy production that will have to be made over the next 20 years," said Marchant. "The attention being focused on next month's Copenhagen Climate Summit is justifiable but there is also an onus on organisations, companies and individuals to take their own action, and progressing carbon-capture technologies and placing a time limit on the operation of coal-fired power stations comes into that category."

SSE is also involved in the world's largest demonstration of oxyfuel-combustion-capture technology in Renfrew, in which coal is combusted in a mixture of oxygen and recirculated flue gas so that the resulting exhaust is almost pure carbon dioxide that can be captured and stored.