RWE Eemshaven

Energy supplier Essent is currently constructing a highly efficient 1600 MW coal/biomass power plant at the Eemshaven. Necessary provisions in the design of the power plant and its facilities have been made to enable CO2 capture technologies in the future.

For Eemshaven Essent considers participating in an EU support scheme, which allows for partial funding of a large scale Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) demonstration project. Several studies have been undertaken for the design and integration of a 250 MWe capture unit. Partners for transport and storage of the CO2 have also developed technical concepts supporting the overall CCS chain development. Since there is currently no support for on-shore storage, the focus has shifted to off-shore storage. Initial thoughts are to create a CO2 hub in the North of the Netherlands, combining CO2 streams from different sources, and link this with a CO2 hub in the Rijnmond area, to distribute the CO2 to different locations, e.g. for Enhanced Oil Recovery.

Through the Borg Foundation an extensive program of information and communication around CCS has been developed to answer any questions or issues that will arise with stakeholders around CCS.

Essent, as part of the RWE group, foresees that sooner or later CCS will be applied to large CO2 sources (including power plants) in the Netherlands to meet long-term CO2 target reductions and therefore invests in the development of this technology. Currently, within the RWE group several promising capture technologies are being developed. This includes a pilot facility, based on Cansolve technology, in Aberthaw (UK), a chilled ammonia process in the US and in Niederaussem (Germany) a capture pilot with BASF/Linde technology.