Four bidders chosen for £1bn carbon capture competition

The government has announced that four bidders have been short listed for the next phase of its £1bn Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) competition.

The government is providing funding to support the development of CCS technology, which if developed at scale, could allow the safe removal and storage of harmful carbon emissions from coal and gas plant.

The four bidders were selected from eight bids received after an evaluation process that considered project deliverability, value for money, and the government’s timetable to deliver a cost-competitive CCS industry in the 2020s. 

The bidders are:

• Captain Clean Energy Project: A proposal for a new 570MW, fully abated coal Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (pre-combustion) project in Grangemouth, Scotland with storage in offshore depleted gas fields.  Led by Summit Power, involving Petrofac (CO2 Deepstore), National Grid and Siemens.   
• Peterhead: A 340MW Post-combustion capture retrofitted to part of an existing 1180MW Combined Cycle Gas Turbine power station at Peterhead, Scotland. Led by Shell and SSE. 
• Teesside Low Carbon Project: A Pre-combustion coal gasification project (linked to c330MWe net power generating capacity fuelled by syngas with 90% of CO2 abated) on Teesside, North East England with storage in depleted oil field and saline aquifer.  A consortium led by Progressive Energy and involving GDF SUEZ, Premier Oil, and BOC.
• White Rose Project: An Oxyfuel capture project at a proposed new 304MW fully abated supercritical coal-fired power station on the Drax site in North Yorkshire.  Led by Alstom and involving Drax, BOC and National Grid. 

The bidders are now being invited to take part in a period of intensive commercial negotiations with government before decisions on which projects to support further are taken in the new year. 

Energy secretary Ed Davey said: “We have received some quality bids from industry who have really risen to the challenge set by the competition.

“The projects we have chosen to take forward have all shown that they have the potential to kick-start the creation of a new CCS industry in the UK, but further discussions are needed to ensure we deliver value-for-money for taxpayers. 

“Today’s announcement is an important step towards an exciting new industry, one that could help us reduce our carbon emissions and create thousands of jobs.”

“We have one of the best offers in the world and are a leading country in Europe. We will remain in close contact with the European Commission in the coming months as they take their decisions on which projects to support with European funding.”