New Study Will Look At Feasibility of CCS in the UK

A new study commissioned by the Energy Technologies Institute was announced today. The study will be a £3.5m project which will attempt to identify possible sites around the UK for capturing and storing carbon emissions.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change has begun incorporating carbon capture and storage (CCS) into its plans for controlling emissions in the UK. Currently, it has been advised that the depleting oil and gas fields in the North Sea will be an ideal site for CCS technology, but currently no studies have been undertaken to detail the feasibility of this assumption.

David Clarke, chief executive of ETI stated that it would be beneficial to obtain accurate estimates in relation to storage capacity potential at the location in order to aid the government in determining the reality of available space for CCS within the UK.

The project is being called the United Kingdom CO2 Storage Appraisal Project and is being headed by Senergy Alternative Energy. The study is expected to be completed by March 2011. The announcement of the study comes in the wake of the UK’s CCS policy being pulled onto unsteady ground with E.ON’s announcement that it will delay their coal-fired power plant plans at Kingsnorth.