Brussels backs Vattenfall CCS project
9 Dec 2009
Brussels – Vattenfall’s planned demonstration carbon capture and storage (CCS) power plant at Jänschwalde in Brandenburg, Germany, is to receive up to Euro180 million of funding from the EU Commission. The money is to come from the EEPR (European Energy Programme for Recovery), the European economic programme for energy that was adopted in June 2009.
EU energy commissioner Andris Pie-balgs announced the result in Brussels today, following the prior inclusion of the member states and the European Parliament in the decision-making process. Six innovative CCS projects are being supported with money from the EU fund.
“We welcome this necessary support to our demonstration plant at Jänschwalde and other sites in Europe. It is vital to keep momentum in the further development of CCS,” said says Bjarne Korshøj, CCS manager at Vattenfall. “We need several successful CCS demonstration plants in Europe to make CCS commercially available by 2020 for large-scale deployment of the technology in the decades to come.”
. Vattenfall’s CCS demonstration plant at Jänschwalde is to be connected to the grid by 2015: the project carrying an estimated investment cost ofEuro1.5bn. The electrical power capacity of the demo plant will be around 385MW of electricity, with a CO2 capture rate of well over 90%, up to 2.7 million tonnes per year.
Vattenfall says its engineers have been developing, testing and demonstrating CCS technology since 2000. Key activities include an oxyfuel pilot plant at Schwarze Pumpe in Germany, the construction of a pre-combustion pilot plant at Buggenum in the Netherlands, and plans for the development of a large scale CO2 capture plant at Nuon Magnum in the Netherlands.
The company also has plans for CCS at Nordjyllandsværket in Denmark after 2020 when technology is commercially viable. Vattenfall has already made available and invested over € 200m for the development of CCS technology.
