European FP7 project

• Cesar
• DECARBit
   

European FP6 projects

• Castor
• Encap
• CO₂ReMoVe
• EU Geocapacity
• DeSanns
• Coach
• Caprice
• CO₂GeoNet
• Inca-CO₂

CESAR

CESAR (CO₂ Enhanced Separation and Recovery) is an European FP7 project coordinated by TNO.
 
CESAR aims for a breakthrough in the development of low-cost post-combustion CO₂ capture technology in order to provide an economically feasible solution for both new large scale power plants and the retrofit of existing power plants which are responsible for the majority of all anthropogenic CO₂ emissions (worldwide, approx. 5,000 power plants emit around 11 GtCO₂/year).
 
With CESAR, we focus on post-combustion capture as it is generally accepted to be the most economically feasible for retrofitting existing power plants. Moreover, analysis of the current R&D projects in Europe shows that there is yet no follow-up to the post-combustion work in the CASTOR project while R&D aimed at other types of carbon capture technologies have been accommodated for.
 
CESAR aims at breakthroughs via a combination of fundamental research on advanced separation processes, capture process modelling and integration and solvent process validation studies, with long lasting experimental tests in the large (existing) Esbjerg Pilot Plant.
 
CESAR is in the continuation of the previous FP6 integrated project CASTOR. The consortium is mostly the same and the pilot built in the frame of this previous project will be reused for CESAR.
 
>> More information on the CESAR project (PDF - 35 Ko)

DECARBit

DECARBit responds to the urgent need for further research and development in advanced pre-combustion capture techniques to substantially reduce emissions of greenhouse gases from fossil fuel power plants. The project will accelerate the technology development and contribute to the deployment of large-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) plants, in line with the adopted European policies for emission reductions. The concerned technologies are IGCC (Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle) for coal, and IRCC (Integrated Reforming Combined Cycle) for natural gas.
 
DECARBit- short for “Decarbonise it”, is established by 16 legal entities constituting the core group of the project. These encompass five leading industrial technology providers, two technology end-users (one utility and one oil&gas company) and nine highly ranked RTD providers representing a total of eight countries.
 
The focus of the project is to pursue the search for new and improved pre-combustion technologies.
 
DECARBit is designed as a Collaborative Large-scale Integrating Project. Its activities comprise theoretical and experimental investigations leading to full pilot testing.
 
Key expected impacts of DECARBit, all complying with the Work Programme are:

• cost reduced pre-combustion capture of CO₂ promoting the development and deployment of large scale CCS plants (10-12 by 2020). Industrial uptake is further promoted through an Industrial Contact Group established within the project framework;
• strengthen the competitiveness of the European industry and economy by maintaining and reinforcing a leading position in CCS technologies, and by exploring the potential impacts for other energy-intensive industries.

Within the project, IFP is involved in the development of a technological innovation that consists in using adsorbents in a revolving-bed reactor at high temperature to separate the oxygen from air. Using oxygen rather than air in the reformer (or gasifier) reduces the overall cost of CO₂ capture.
 
>> More information on the DECARBit project

CASTOR

This EC-funded and IFP-run project involves capturing and providing geological storage for 30% of the emissions released by large industrial facilities around Europe (conventional power stations, principally), i.e. for 10% of Europe’s CO₂ emissions.
Castor counts members from 11 EU countries, including:

• 30 industrial firms (Dong Energy, Vattenfall, Repsol, Statoil, GDF Suez, Rohoel, etc),
• 12 research institutes (IFP, BGRM, Imperial College, TNO, BGS, IFP, etc.).

Its specific goals involve halving the cost of capturing and separating CO₂, developing the geological-storage concept’s efficiency, safety and security while limiting its environmental impact, and testing it in real-life, industrial-scale facilities.

It inaugurated its pilot industrial facility alongside a power plant run by Dong Energy (formerly Elsam) in Esbjerg, Denmark, on 15 mars 2006. This facility can capture one ton of CO₂ an hour. By running this program, IFP is contributing to European research in the area of curbing climate change.

>> More information on the Castor project
>> More information on the industrial pilot unit of the Castor project

ENCAP

Vattenfall, an energy company, is running ENCAP, another FP6 project dealing with capturing CO₂ from conventional power stations.

This project is focusing on oxycombustion and precombustion methods to capture CO₂. It began in March 2004 and will last five years.

IFP is mainly involved in the Chemical Looping Combustion (CLC) subproject alongside Alstom, Siemens, Sintef, TNO and Chalmers University of Technology, among other partners. CLC technology is used to convert hydrocarbon fuel directly into CO₂ and H₂O. The oxygen is supplied via a metal oxide, alternately oxidized by air and reduced by the fuel.

This project is pursuing two goals:

• adapting the CLC process to the use of coal in a circulating fluidized bed,
• developing reactors for the application of CLC to combined-cycle gas turbines.

IFP is thus working on methods for the industrial production of materials (metal oxide-based) intended for use in fluidized beds as well as the development of a natural gas-powered rotating CLC reactor designed for gas turbines.

>> More information on the ENCAP project

CO2ReMoVe

CO₂ReMoVe is another European project funded under FP6. The goal, here, is to research CO₂ geological storage verification and surveillance systems.

This consortium counts 27 partners spanning industrial firms, research centers and service providers with experience in CO₂ geological storage. They are working together to propose the development and application of a range of monitoring techniques, applied across an integrated portfolio of storage sites (Sleipner, Snovhit, In-Salah and Ketzin, for instance). In each of those sites, CO₂ReMoVe is developing:

• methods for base-line site evaluation,
• new tools to monitor storage and possible well and surface leakage,
• new tools to predict and model long-term storage behavior and risk,
• rigorous risk-assessment methodologies for a variety of sites and time-scales,
• best-practice guidelines for industry, policy makers and regulators.

This project began on 1 March 2006 and will draw to a close on 1 March 2011.

IFP is coordinating tasks associated with modeling efficiency at industrial sites providing geological storage for CO₂. Access to data from these sites is used to test and clear measuring tools, and to develop new surveillance methods.

>> More information on the CO₂ReMoVe project

EU GEOCAPACITY

This three-year project kicked off on 1 January 2006, with a view to developing a tool to appraise CO₂ geological-storage capacity in aquifers, hydrocarbon reservoirs and unused coal seams.

The European Union is funding this project under FP6, and GEUS (Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland) is coordinating the 26 partners, which encompass:

• institutes of geology and universities: GEUS (the coordinator), US, RGN, CGS, IGTUT, BRGM, BGR, IGME, ELGI, OGS, IFP, LEGMA, IGG, TNO-NITG, Ecofys, MEERI, PBG, GeoEcoMar, SGUDS, GEO-INZ, IGME and BGS;
• industrial firms: EniTecnologie, ENDESA Generacion and Vattenfall;
• the Ministry of Science and Industry of the People’s Republic of China.

EU Geocapacity has picked up where GETSCO, another European project, left off. It will be using its findings to assess CO2 geological-storage capacity in China, mainly, as well as in current and future European Union Member States.

IFP’s role involves coordinating storage-capacity assessments in oil and gas reservoirs, coal seams, and aquifers.

>> More information on the EU GeoCapacity project

DeSANNS

The DeSANNS (Design Synthesis and Application of Novel Nanoporous Sorbents) project’s self-explanatory goal is to develop new nanoporous materials for separation by adsorption, with a view to using them to purify hydrogen and capture CO₂.

Research encompasses two material families:

• periodic mesoporous oxides,
• metal organic frameworks.

Partners are using state-of-the-art technology for material synthesis, molecular modeling, spectroscopic characterization and high-pressure adsorption to achieve fundamental understanding of the synthesis-structure-adsorption triangle and thereby optimize adsorbent efficiency in target applications.

IFP’s role here is to contribute its experience with industrial issues. It shares information about applications, works on new process diagrams, extrapolates the most efficient material syntheses, and provides preliminary economic assessments.

COACH

IFP is coordinating COACH, an FP6 project stemming from the agreement to work together against global warming that the European Union and China signed in 2006. The eight Chinese and twelve European industrial firms, research centers and public-sector organizations working on this project will draft the technical recommendations required to design a coal-fired power plant in China. That plant will include facilities to capture CO₂ and the project will also deal with transport and storage of CO₂ in a mature oil and gas reservoir. Building work is scheduled to begin in 2011, and the capture and storage chain should come on stream in 2015.

The fact that IFP has been entrusted with coordinating the COACH project bears witness to its acknowledged expertise in the CO₂ capture, transport and geological-storage chain, and to its central role in European-level research endeavors. Over the medium term, these technologies will enable operators to use coal, a fossil fuel, while mitigating its impact on the environment.

>> More information on the COACH project

CAPRICE

This project began on 1 January 2007. TNO, a Dutch organization, is running it. CAPRICE stands for CO₂ capture using Amine Process International Cooperation and Exchange and involves pooling information and research findings on amine-enabled CO₂ capture with non-European CSLF countries.

More specifically, findings from the European Castor project’s MEA (Mono-Ethanol-Amine) chapter will be compared with those of the University of Regina (Canada) and ITC (International Test Center).

CAPRICE is funded by the European Union and is scheduled to last two years. It counts:

• 10 research centers (Regina University, Alberta Research Council, International Test Center, Energy Inet, IFP, Trondheim University, Stuttgart University, Tsinghua University, Topchiev Institute of Petrochemical Synthesis, and Salvador University);
• 3 industrial electricity companies (E-ON, Dong Energy and Vattenfall).

IFP’s role involves transmitting data from the Castor project (results from monitoring of corrosion with MEA washing on the Castor pilot) to the University of Regina.

CO2GeoNet

This five-year-long FP6-funded project was launched in 2004 and aims to improve CO₂ storage conditions in deep geological strata. It counts 13 partner universities and research centers from France (IFP, BRGM), the UK (BGS, Imperial College, Heriot-Watt University), Norway (SINTEF, IRIS, NIVA), Italy (OGS, University of Rome), Germany (BGR), Holland (TNO) and Denmark (GEUS).

At this point, the emphasis is on developing new CO₂ storage methods and optimizing numerical modeling tools. Other goals include encouraging long-term partnerships between research centers across Europe and identifying new research themes. Lastly, CO₂GeoNet partners are responsible for circulating information and knowledge with a view to bolstering international exposure for European research in the field of CO₂ geological storage.

As in Coach and Castor, IFP’s involvement in CO₂GeoNet bears witness to its commitment to playing an active role in efforts to curb global warming.

>> More information on the CO₂GeoNet project

INCA-CO2

Inca-CO₂ (International Co-operation Actions on CO₂ Capture and Storage), another IFP-run project, aims to coordinate and secure international exposure for Europe’s expertise in the field of CO₂ capture. IFP is working on this project with:

• 6 European research centers: BGS (UK), BRGM (France), GEUS (Denmark), OGS (Italy), Sintef (Norway) and TNO (Holland);
• 4 leading industrial firms: Alstom, BP, Statoil and Vattenfall.

Partners are working simultaneously on a number of goals. They are identifying opportunities for future cooperation between Europe and countries outside it (Australia, Canada, the United States and Japan). They also provide European delegates to international organizations with all necessary input pertaining to this field of expertise.

Paired with its efforts to lead the Castor European initiative, this project bolsters IFP’s prominent position in international efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.