The government said a CCS test center at Mongstad, the precursor to full-scale capture from 2014, won't now startup until after the power unit has come online, in contrast with earlier plans for trial CCS to start alongside the plant.
"Thorough preparatory work is necessary for the test facility...leading up to a full scale CO2 capture system," Norway's ministry for petroleum and energy said Wednesday. "The planned start of the test facility is thus set to 2011, after the starting-up of the power station," it added.
According to an agreement between operator StatoilHydro ASA (STO) and the Norwegian government, the government is responsible for establishing a transport and storage solution for 100,000 metric tons of CO2 annually from the CCS test center. In a shift from its original plans, the government said Wednesday that the options evaluated for transport and storage of CO2, including shipping it to Snoehvit gas field in northern Norway and speeding up work for a full scale pipe transport for CO2, were too expensive and would take too long.
Instead, it said: "Certified emission reductions for an annual emission of 100 000 tons CO2 will be purchased until the facility is tied into a full scale transport and storage solution."
The deputy director of Norwegian environmental group Bellona, Marius Holm, said: "Now we feel betrayed by the government. We see that we will not pass any point of no return (to full scale CCS at Mongstad) in this parliamentary term. We feel uncertain about the project as a whole."
Holm said that Bellona had supported the agreement on Mongstad, which would allow a four-year window between 2010 and 2014 for full-scale CO2 CCS to be implemented. "We saw an agreement which committed both parties very strongly. Compared with other projects, we were rather certain this would actually happen," he said.
He added that as the emissions permit granted for Mongstad gas power plant "specifically says the CO2 shall not be emitted from the test center, we expected they would start investing in infrastructure for the full scale CCS plant in parallel with development of the CCS test center."
Holm concluded: "So we have a government which says that they will land on the moon, a metaphor for this project. But the only thing they will actually produce is a test center - that's the only physical result of their investment."
The backing down by the government won't be the last chapter of the politically fraught saga, Holm predicted, saying that as the latest decision contravenes the Mongstad emissions permit by emitting CO2, the project will need to reapply for an amended permit which could now be refused.
Denmark's Dong Energy, Royal Dutch Shell PLC (RDSA), StatoilHydro, Vattenfall and Gassova are the partners in the flagship Mongstad CCS project.