Texan CCS project receives US$350m DoE grant

A carbon capture and sequestration project which is being developed by Bainbridge Island and Summit Power Group in West Texas, has received a US$350m grant from the US Department of Energy (DoE). The US$1.75bn project will involve building an integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) 400MW power plant at Summit’s Penwell, TX, along with the equipment needed to capture 90 per cent of the resulting CO₂ emissions. This will be then sold to oil companies across the Southwest, allowing greater oil production via enhanced oil recovery (EOR).

The project has several advantages over its peers including the fact that it plans to use both coal and petcoke. In addition, it will sell some of the syngas produced to a chemical plant for the production of urea. The fact that the CO₂ will be sold to support EOR, is expected to boost the project’s revenues by around 50 per cent. According to Laura Miller, the former Dallas mayor who is currently leading the project, this should cover one-third of the revenues Summit will need in order to service the US$550m in equity investment and the US$1bn or so in loans it will require if the project to start by the end of this year (Technology Review).