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Learning from Petra Nova: What are the lessons for carbon capture?
NRG's Petra Nova carbon capture project in Texas was one of the biggest of its kind before closing in 2020, and it served its primary purpose - to progress carbon capture technology, and delivered valuable insight about this emerging technology. The closure generated headlines, skeptics interpret as death knell for future projects and ‘Red-Flag’ for investors on coal-fired CCS projects. The key insights, however, presents a more balanced view:
KEY INSIGHTS
CCS RELEVANCE: COAL FIRED CCS PROJECT & CAPTURE / EOR STORAGE
NRG’s Petra Nova facility in Texas – a coal-based project which represents the world’s largest installation of CO2 (5200 tons/d) capture on a power plant, arguably much more challenging with low CO2 concentrations and Storage linked to oil EOR then other more easily captured industrial streams.
KEY LESSONS LEARNT
- There was 16% shortfall in CO2 captured over the period; largely due to downtime; largely in process chain rather than Mitsubishi’s capture technology
- The outages themselves are not red-flag on capture technology that eventually maintained 95 % uptime.
- Issues encountered, mostly concerning leaking heat-exchangers; are surmountable as in in similar Canadian Boundary Dam project
- It was primarily conceived as technology demonstration project; scaling up and identifying technical issues with capture process
- Mitsubishi stated that learnings from project and improving capture could reduce cost by 30% (claims to be tested in Prairie State coal power plant in Illinois)
- Financial viability relied on alignment of incentives; DOE grant, cheap credit from Japan, and part-ownership in oil field.
- Newer projects to rely on expanded 45Q tax credit, favoring CO2 storage in saline aquifer which gives larger tax credit than EOR ($50/tonne vs $35 /tonne)
- Part-ownership in oilfield, with no long-term off-take agreement and price plummeting was unique to PetroNova, The Canadian Boundary Dam 3 project off takers continue to take gas CO2 during downturn
BOTTOMLINE
Although, not a red-flag for the CCS or the power industry, nevertheless, even with 45Q, tax credit; the margins for large scale investment in CCS for thermal power generation will be tight.
Learning from Petra Nova: What are the lessons for carbon capture?
NRG's Petra Nova carbon capture project in Texas was one of the biggest of its kind before closing in 2020, and it delivered valuable insight for industry.
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