The University of Regina's patented carbon capture technology has been selected for use in a major carbon capture project in North Dakota.
An agreement has been signed between HTC Purenergy, Doosan Babcock and Basin Electric Power Co-operative to undertake a front-end engineering and design (FEED) study on a carbon capture and storage project in North Dakota. The project is valued at $6.24 million. The University of Regina has worked in conjunction with HTC Purenergy, a global leader in carbon capture and storage systems, to develop new technologies.
"The world is taking note of our commercial-ready technology designed to reduce carbon in our atmosphere while promoting sustainable energy solutions," says University of Regina President Vianne Timmons. "We are very proud of the work we are doing with HTC Purenergy and Doosan Babcock to make this significant international project materialize."
"This is a major advance in applying Saskatchewan technology at the forefront of carbon capture research to address sustainable energy solutions and the University is very proud to be working with HTC and Doosan in leading such significant work," says David Gauthier, U of R vice-president (Research.)
Doosan Babcock designs, supplies and constructs advanced steam generation technology for the power industry.
Basin Electric is a co-operative based in Bismarck, North Dakota, that generates and supplies electricity to 2.8 million consumers in nine states.
The technology that will be used to capture carbon from Basin Electric's Antelope Valley coal-fired power plant was developed at the University of Regina's International Test Centre for CO2 Capture (ITC), one of the world's leading institutes for post-combustion carbon capture technology research and development.
"Doosan Babcock and HTC will provide and integrate world leading commercial-ready carbon capture technology, developed at the University of Regina, into the Basin Electric Antelope Valley Station coal-fired power plant," says Lionel Kambeitz, chair and CEO of HTC Purenergy.
The CO2 captured from one of two coal-fired generating units at the Antelope station near Beulah, North Dakota, will be used for enhanced oil recovery and in the process store CO2 deep underground.
"We are continuing to drive down the energy requirement and operating costs associated with carbon capture in our world-class laboratories and pilot plants," says Paitoon Tontiwachwuthikul, the U of R dean of engineering, who is leading the research team at the University. "Our technology has allowed us to reduce the operating costs by more than 60 percent."
Carbon capture and storage is considered by many scientists to be a vital climate change mitigation technology for dramatically reducing CO2 emissions from large emission sources such as steel, cement and chemical plants, as well as natural gas and coal-fired power plants.