ETI launches £20m carbon capture project
14 Oct 2012
London – The Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) is to invest up to £20 million to develop new carbon capture technology, via a consortium to be led by Inventys in collaboration with Howden, Doosan Power Systems and MAST.
The first phase of the project will see the ETI invest £1.6 million in a small scale demonstrator prototype, lab work and techno-economic assessment of the projected benefits.
The ETI then expects to invest up to £20 million over three years in the detailed design, assembly and testing of a demo plant – towards a goal of large-scale deployment by 2020, at a cost and performance level which could make investment more attractive to project developers.
Within the consortium, Howden will manufacture the large rotating devices in which the carbon adsorbents will be housed, while Inventys will design the carbon dioxide capture process and system known as VeloxoTherm.
Doosan Power Systems is to provide expertise in the area of engineering design, system integration and assessing the commercial value of developing such technology.
MAST will provide the expertise in manufacturing the carbon adsorbent material; and ETI member Rolls-Royce, will provide specialist engineering support for the project.
At Howden’s global head office and UK factory in Renfrew, near Glasgow, its CEO Ian Brander said the project would establish a 5MW carbon capture demonstration plant capable of capturing up to 95% of carbon dioxide emissions designed, built and tested by 2016.
“The technology will be designed to be used on new-build Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT) power stations or to retrofit Carbon Capture Storage (CCS) onto CCGT power stations, which, in the longer term, will help position the UK as a leading provider of next generation low carbon technologies,” said Brander.
“The technology that will be employed by the consortium is based around post combustion capture using a structured carbon adsorbent, housed within a rotating bed,” he added. An initial assessment by the ETI suggests that the technology could reduce the typical cost of electricity by 13% when compared to current CCS technology*.
For the ETI, chief executive Dr David Clarke commented: “With a large and relatively young CCGT fleet in operation, and the prospect of new builds continuing into the future, we are likely to enter 2020 with 30GW of CCGT capacity, much of which will require retrofit with CCS by 2030 if we are to meet UK CO2 reduction targets.
“Newly developed technology which reduces costs and accelerates deployment for new builds and retrofits by 2030 is both salient and timely.”
This project adds to the ETI’s existing £33-million investment in its technology programme to establish CCS infrastructure capability for the UK.
The ETI has recently completed a major study to assess carbon dioxide storage capacity in the UK. ETI’s current activity in this field includes a CCS system modelling tool-kit to help support the future design, operation and roll-out of cost effective UK-based CCS systems and the commissioning last year of a £23.5 million CCS Next Generation Coal Capture Technology Demonstrator project.
The Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) is a public-private partnership between global industries - BP, Caterpillar, EDF, E.ON, Rolls-Royce and Shell - and the UK Government’s department for business, innovation and skills, with funding channelled through the Technology Strategy Board and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.
