Friday 18 July 2014

US starts constructing $1bn CCS facility

Construction has started on the first commercial-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) facility in the US.

The $1 billion (£0.6bn) Petro Nova Project, a joint venture between NRC Energy and JX Nippon, is said to be the largest such project in the world, according to the US Department of Energy.

The facility is expected to capture around 1.4 million metric tons of carbon dioxide every year from an existing coal-fired power plant in Texas.

The captured CO2 will then be used to extract additional "hard-to-access" oil from a previously depleted field 80 miles away while storing the carbon underground in the process.

Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said: “With coal expected to remain a significant part of the energy portfolio in the US and internationally, first-of-a-kind projects like Petra Nova will move us toward a low carbon energy future.”