Carbon Capture Costs: FEED & pre-FEED Cost Reports

In March 2010, the Scottish CCS (Carbon Capture & Storage) Consortium began an extensive Front End, Engineering and Design (FEED) study to assess what exactly would be required from an engineering, commercial and regulatory, perspective in order to progress the CCS demonstration project at Longannet Power station in Scotland (Goldeneye) through to construction. The study has yielded invaluable knowledge in areas such as cost, design, end-to-end CCS chain operation, health and safety, environment, consent and permitting, risk management, and lessons learnt.

Membrane Technology and Research Inc., with Technology Centre Mongstad, Dresser-Rand, Trimeric Corporation, and WorleyParsons/Advisian, is scaling up its advanced Polaris™ membranes for post-combustion CO₂ capture and testing them at engineering scale at TCM in Norway. The Polaris membranes, about 20 times more permeable than prior commercial versions, use a patented selective recycle design to boost CO₂ concentration in flue gas and lower capture costs. The project will design, build, and operate a modular membrane system for a six-month field test, including performance verification, steady-state operation, techno-economic updates, and integration studies with advanced compression technology.

Scope starts with the receipt of natural gas and fuel gas mixture from the existing Plant 01 and Plant 09 source and terminates with hydrogen (H₂) at the required specification and conditions to be used as fuel in the existing SMR unit. High concentration CO₂ from the ATR is captured and H₂ production from the proposed facility will replace the fuel gas feed to the primary reformer for heating. The facility capacity is based on the heating duty required to replace the current fuel source. The scope for the study involves the new ATR unit and associated downstream shift, CO₂ capture, and syngas purification unit. The project scope also includes an ASU to supply oxygen to the ATR unit.