Delivering the new CCS agenda: Government Updates

During the second session, the Government updates were presented to the CCUS audience from two invited speakers at the UKCCSRC spring conference at the University of Cambridge on the 26th March 2018.

Government’s new Approach to CCUS, Will Lochhead, BEIS

Will Lochhead has presented the two main documents recently published about CCUS which are the Industrial Strategy to decarbonise the private sector in UK (released last November) and the Clean Growth Strategy report for delivering a low carbon future.

The UK ambition is to become the global technology leader in CCUS by 1) increasing the commitment to deploy CCUS in UK, 2) international collaborations and 3) new investments.

The 2018 will be very important in order to have the first results of the CCUS Cost Challenge Taskforce, the new pathway to deploy CCUS and a review of the investment model including also the test of CCUS in the big clusters in UK. The UK government initiative is also committed to continue the current international partnership, such as the Mission Innovation and the private-led initiative from the OGCI. Other collaborations will include the ones already established with US, Norway, Canada and Australia, as well as new programmes with Indonesia, China, Mexico and South Africa. It is worth mentioning that the UK is hosting a Global CCUS conference.

The activity of CCU demonstration programme (overall £20 million) will start the 19th of April with industrial engagement.

Powering Past Coal Alliance, Emma Owens, BEIS

Emma Owens delivered the session titled ‘Powering Past Coal Alliance’’. Owens from BEIS spoke about the commitment of phase out coal-fired plants. Coal-fired power plants produce almost 40 per cent of global electricity today, making carbon pollution from coal a leading contributor to climate change. At least 25 countries have committed under the umbrella of the Powering Past Coal Alliance to systematically phase out coal utilization in electricity generation.

The declaration contains three main commitments:

1. Government partners to commit coal phase out by 2030 (OECD), 2040 (China) and 2050 (rest of the world)
2. Business and other non-governmental partners’ commitment to power their business or operations with non-coal fired power plants.
3. All partners commit to supporting clean power through their policies and investment.

To crystallize these goals, the partners in Powering Past Coal will work closely to share technical information, climate financing and adoption of practical initiatives towards phasing-out of coal, this will also include developing clean energy plans and targets. The Alliance is looking forward to boost its membership in COP24 in Poland 2018 in an effort to offset the chances of global temperature rise above 2^oC.

The main questions from the participants were related to the collaborative projects with other countries which will mostly focus on R&D but also other specific issue will be addressed. Another question was on what is the expectation for the cost of CO₂ capture which does not include only the technology deployment but also the public acceptance and the effect on jobs market.

This blog was co-authored by Vincenzo Spallina, Abul’Aziz Aliyu, Karen Finney