Displaying items by tag: CCUS

North America: Aker Carbon Capture and MAN Energy Solutions have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to explore carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) and CO₂ compression opportunities in North America. The collaboration will combine Aker Carbon Capture's amine capture technology with MAN Energy Solutions’ compressor technology to provide standardised and modularised solutions, with optimised energy consumption and delivery time. Both parties are currently participating in the Brevik capture and storage project with Heidelberg Materials Northern Europe in Norway. Rystad Energy has forecast potential capture capacity across North American industries of 200Mt/yr by 2030.

Aker Carbon Capture head of North America Jonah Margulis said "This agreement will strengthen our position to remove and reduce carbon emissions from industries and energy solutions, which is supported by strong incentives from the US government."

MAN Energy Solutions head of sales and project management, carbon capture and storage, Marco Ernst said "We are delighted to work with Aker Carbon Capture, which appreciates our comprehensive expertise in compressor solutions in general and in the area of CO₂ compression in particular. We feel encouraged by the high level of interest in our technical solution concepts that we are on the right path towards sustainable decarbonisation of the industries that have previously had particularly high emissions."

Switzerland: Carbon capture and storage (CCS) equipment developer and supplier Neustark says it plans to more than double the number of its CO₂ storage sites in Austria, France, Germany, Switzerland and the UK to 34 from 14. Neustark’s process turns mineralised captured CO₂ and existing mineral waste streams into useful limestone. Building materials producers lease Neustark’s storage sites to produce reduced-CO₂ alternatives such as recycled concrete. The sites currently have a total storage capacity of 5000t. Existing customers include Holcim.

Neustark CEO Johannes Tiefenthaler said “Neustark is scaling up rapidly, and we’re well on track to achieve our aim of permanently removing 1Mt of CO₂ by 2030. Our global goal is a series of reliable, region-specific CCS facilities that can be replicated anywhere, offering immediate sustainability benefits to local supply chains.”

Latvia: Schwenk Latvija plans to build a 750,000t/yr carbon capture system at its 2Mt/yr Brocēni cement plant. The producer has hired Norway-based Capsol Technologies to conduct a CapsolEoP carbon capture feasibility study at the plant. Schwenk Latvija is a member of the CCS Baltic Consortium, which achieved provisional inclusion on the European Commission’s list of Projects of Common Interest in November 2023.

Schwenk Northern Europe CEO Reinhold Schneider said “Checking the best carbon capture methods and how they can be integrated with our production process is a crucial task for us on the way to carbon neutrality, and likely the major investment direction for the coming decade. To that end, we are excited to investigate the energy consumption and the scale of equipment required for carbon capture at the Brocēni plant, if potentially partnering with Capsol for this challenge.”

Capsol Technologies CEO Jan Kielland said “We are excited to work with Schwenk, one of the most innovative building materials producers in Europe, which has constantly improved its processes to reduce emissions since operations started at the Brocēni plant’s new kiln line in 2010” He added “With this feasibility study, we are taking another step towards building a position as the preferred carbon capture technology provider for cement.”

Capsol’s project pipeline includes 10 large-scale cement projects in the sales engineering and engineering studies phase. The total CO₂ capture capacity of these projects is 11Mt/yr.

Germany: Switzerland-based CO₂ mineralisation technology developer Neustark says that it sees major potential for recycling concrete from construction and demolition waste (CDW) to produce carbon-negative products using its process in Germany. Neustark inaugurated its first German plant, and 12th overall, at Marzahn in Berlin in late 2023. Capital Online News has reported that the start-up estimates that Germany generates 60Mt/yr of CDW concrete, but only recycles 600,000t/yr (1%). This contrasts with international CDW concrete recycling rates as high as 15% in Switzerland and the US.

The start-up, founded at the Federal Institute of Technology Zurich in 2019, currently absorbs 10kg/t of CO₂ in its recycled materials, but aims to reach 60kg/t. Its investors include Holcim.

UK: The World Cement Association (WCA) marked the achievement of an ‘historic’ global consensus for decarbonisation at the COP28 climate change conference in the UAE in December 2023 with a new call to global cement producers and suppliers. The association called on all participants in the industry to help promote developments in reduced-CO₂ cement production through enhanced connectivity and communication. It said that technologies like alternative raw materials and alternative fuels (AF), efficiency-enhancing process changes and carbon capture and utilisation (CCU) are widely applied, but unequally, applied in the global cement industry.

Regarding the disparity between different markets, the WCA said “This imbalance underscores the critical need for more research and development funding in emerging markets, where there is real demand for this kind of support as a crucial enabler of progress.” It added “We will join hands with our members and stakeholders to advance the low-carbon and sustainable development of the industry and contribute to building a clean, safe and beautiful world.”

Japan: Sumitomo Osaka Cement, Sumitomo Corporation, JFE Steel, Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha and Woodside Energy have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to jointly conduct a business feasibility study looking at setting up a CO₂ hub in the Setouchi and Shikoku regions. It will examine how CO₂ can be collected from different industries, transported to a hub port and then shipped to Australia for sequestration. A signing of the MOU was held at the ASEAN-Japan Economic Co-Creation Forum in the presence of Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Ken Saito.

Sumitomo Osaka Cement operates two integrated plants in the Setouchi and Shikoku regions at Ako and Kochi respectively.

Greece: The EU Innovation Fund has awarded a Euro234m grant to Titan Group for its IFESTOS carbon capture and storage (CCS) project. Titan Group said that the project, the largest initiative of its kind in Europe, marks a ‘monumental leap forward’ in its decarbonisation journey. The company hopes that the project will help to promote the deployment of carbon capture technology in Greece and beyond.

IFESTOS director and project leader Aris Tsikouras said “This agreement solidifies our group’s role as leaders in driving transformative change in industrial decarbonisation across Europe. IFESTOS encapsulates our commitment to sustainability and innovation, forging a path toward a cleaner, greener and more resilient future for the industry, in line with EU climate policy.”

Germany: The European Union Innovation Fund has awarded Heidelberg Materials Euro191m in funding to support its development of a carbon capture and storage (CCS) value chain at Geseke cement plant in North Rhine-Westphalia. The planned project, called GeZero, involves the construction of an oxyfuel kiln, capture system and train transport infrastructure. Having received the funding, Heidelberg Materials and its partners will commence work in January 2024. They will subsequently scale the capture system to 700,000t/yr and build pipelines to transport CO2. Energy provider Wintershall Dea will receive the CO₂ at its upcoming coastal hub for processing and storage below the North Sea.

Heidelberg Materials Germany general manager Christian Knell said “Together with our partners, we walk the talk and pave the way for CCS in Germany. GeZero will complement our global project portfolio with a truly unique approach. We are developing a promising novel solution for inland cement sites, with the intention to inspire industry peers and other emission-intensive sectors to follow.”

Global chief custainability officer Nicola Kimm said “The successful grant agreement demonstrates the relevance of GeZero for the decarbonisation of our sector, and the trust that European authorities place in our approach.”

Sinoma International Engineering revealed this week that it has signed a Euro218m contract to supply a new clinker production line for Holcim Belgium. The scope of the deal covers building the new line from limestone unloading via train to clinker transportation and storage. Provisional acceptance and first clinker are stipulated to occur within about four years, by late 2027. Holcim Belgium operates the Obourg Plant, its only integrated unit in the country, and the unit has been preparing to build a new line as part of its Go4Zero project.

Two main points compete for one’s attention with the project at the Obourg Plant. Firstly, this may be the first time a large Europe-based cement producer has publicly contracted a China-based supplier to build a new production line. Secondly, the new line is part of a process to first replace two wet kilns at the site with a dry kiln. This is part of a grand plan at the site to add oxyfuel technology to the plant and then start capturing most of the CO₂ emitted for sequestration in the North Sea.

On the first point, China-based Sinoma International Engineering reported to the Shanghai Stock Exchange in early December 2023 that it had signed a contract for the project. Holcim Belgium has not said that it has appointed the subsidiary of CNBM but this is not unusual. Buyers are at liberty to name suppliers, or not as may be the case. Holcim has been talking about the Go4Zero project for several years though, so appointing a lead contractor is not surprising.

Yet, some cement companies in Europe have previously been circumspect about revealing the use of China-based suppliers. Lafarge France, for example, did not appear to publicly name the involvement of Sinoma International Engineering and its subsidiaries on the construction of a new line at its Martres-Tolosane cement plant between 2019 and 2022, although Lafarge Poland did say in 2020 that it had contracted China Triumph International Engineering for an upgrade to its Małogoszcz cement plant. No doubt there have been other plant projects in Europe from China-based suppliers that Global Cement Weekly is unaware of. It is also worth considering that just because a lead contractor on a plant project is from a particular country it doesn’t mean that the equipment and other sub-contractors necessarily are. And, of course, to add to the confusion, some Europe-based equipment suppliers are owned by companies based in China.

This leads to the second point. Holcim Belgium’s eventual goal is to set up a full-scale carbon capture, transportation and sequestration (CCUS) operation at Obourg using oxyfuel technology by the end of the 2020s. Spending over Euro200m on building a new (but conventional) production line is not trivial but it is being presented as one step towards creating a cement plant for the net zero age. To this end Holcim Belgium has been less shy in naming its partners for the second phase of the project: Air Liquide; Fluxys; and TotalEnergies. This may be due to the collaborative nature of this phase though and the need to apply for European Union (EU) funding to support it. In July 2023 Holcim disclosed that the EU Innovation Fund had allocated grants for three of its projects including the one at Obourg.

For reference, a number of other full-scale oxyfuel projects have been announced in Europe including in Germany at Heidelberg Materials' Geseke cement plant, Holcim Deutschland's Lägerdorf plant in Germany and Schwenk Zement’s Mergelstetten plant. Another one is planned for Heidelberg Materials’ CBR's Antoing cement plant in Belgium. Most of these are planned for the late 2020s or with pilots sooner. The key bit of information to consider here is that adding oxyfuel technology to a cement kiln (or building one with it to start with) makes it easier to capture CO₂ from the flue gas as it is more concentrated. However, the technology is newer and less-tested than many post-combustion carbon capture methods. Hence, the world’s first full-scale CCUS unit at a cement plant, at Brevik in Norway, will use a post combustion method.

All of this begs the question about where the value will lie in building cement plants for the age of net zero? The planned work at Holcim Belgium’s Obourg Plant pretty much summarises this quandary. Building a cement production line is expensive but the cost of disposing of CO₂ may become the single-biggest driver of whether a plant is profitable or not if governments are serious about reaching net zero. To that end today’s announcement from the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28) calling on the parties to “transition away from fossil fuels to reach net zero” is another sign of the increasing effects of the so-called ‘carbon agenda’ upon the cement sector. In which case the companies that can supply equipment to take care of the CO₂ emissions start becoming more important and discussions over who supplies the rest of the kit less so. Naturally, some cement equipment suppliers are already pivoting towards this approach. Others may find different solutions. Whether this works or not is a question for the future. In the mean-time, building new plants is looking increasingly collaborative.

Poland: The European Commission has granted Lafarge Polska, Air Liquide Polska and energy provider Orlen Euro2.54m in funding for their construction of a 3Mt/yr CO₂ terminal in Gdansk, Pomeranian Voivodeship. The terminal will transmit captured CO₂ from local industrial sites, including 1Mt/yr from Lafarge Polska’s Kujawy w Blelawach cement plant in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, for sequestration below the North Sea. ISB News has reported that the partners will use the European Union funding to complete plans, including front-end engineering design, for the terminal.