903: First carbon captured power applications made

Today’s entry reports on the first DCO applications for power generation that will have their carbon captured.

Over the last two weeks, the first two application for Development Consent Orders for gas-fired power stations have been made that will have their carbon emissions captured, one on Teesside and one on Humberside.

The Teesside one is called ‘Net Zero Teesside’ and will allow other emitters to have their carbon captured as well as the 850MW power station that is the subject of the application.

The Humberside one is called the ‘Keadby 3 Low Carbon Gas Station’ and is a 910MW power station and a carbon capture plant.  It will have to rely on the separate Humber Low Carbon Pipelines project to have its carbon transported to the coast, where, as for the Teesside project, the carbon will then be transported and stored under the North Sea.

By the time of writing, neither set of application documents has been published, but according to the corresponding s46 notifications (ie where the applicants tell the Planning Inspectorate they are consulting), the Teesside project says its emissions ‘will’ be captured and the Keadby one says its emissions ‘can’ be captured.

These applications are significant because they are the first to be made that actually include carbon capture, not just the rather lamer ‘carbon capture ready’.

Meanwhile the government is inviting industrial clusters of emitters to submit cluster plans by 9 July outlining how they propose their emissions will be captured and stored; the guidance document is here. The Energy White Paper has a map showing six main industrial areas that will no doubt be the subject of some of these plans: Grangemouth, Teesside, Humberside, Merseyside, South Wales and Southampton.

It is pleasing to see that we are moving on from the talking phase to the doing phase of net zero.