UKCCSC news 27 June 06

Many news items today, you can read them while listening to Melvyn Bragg's 'In Our Time' radio programme "Carbon - the basis of life". It mentions CCS but is more concerned with general climate, chemistry, etc. Available online at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/inourtime/inourtime_current.shtml

1) Japan plans 200Mt/yr CCS by 2020. This is a sixth of its carbon pollution and 200 times more than Sleipner. http://www.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,1806714,00.html

2) UK nuclear cleanup could be £90 Bn - Treasury Chancellor Gordon Brown has told ministers that the cost of cleaning up Britain's nuclear facilities stands at £90bn, considerably higher than figures produced by the government agency overseeing the task. Plus £14Bn for reactor dismantling. Plus £30 Bn for deep waste disposal.
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,,1789671,00.html

3) "E.ON US to Partner with University of Kentucky to Study Sequestration." The utility company E.ON US is partnering with the University of Kentucky's Center for Applied Energy Research. The three-year, $1.5 million grant and partnership will examine technology that separates and captures carbon dioxide emitted by coal-fired power plants for either geologic storage or a terrestrial sequestration application. April 29, 2006.
http://www.eenews.net/Greenwire/print/2006/04/28/8 (Subscription required.)

4) "Japan to Capture CO2 at Australian Power Plant." A Japanese consortium is planning construction of a carbon dioxide (CO2) liquefying facility, slated to cost about $124 million, with construction to begin in 2007, and startup by 2009. Twenty percent of the CO2 from a power plant in Queensland, Australia would be captured, liquefied and geologically stored. The consortium would be led by J Power and Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries, alongside the Japanese industry ministry and Australian, US and European firms. May 4, 2006.
http://www.zeenews.com/znnew/articles.asp?aid=292761&ssid=51&sid=BUS

5) New for 2007-the International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control. The publisher Elsevier, in association with the IEA Greenhouse Gas R&D Programme, is launching a new journal in 2007 that will cover developments in greenhouse gas control in the power sectors, and major manufacturing and production industries. It will cover all greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and the range of abatement options available, and be comprised of both technical and non-technical related literature. The scope of the journal will include emissions, capture, transmission, and storage of CO₂, as well as alternative mitigation options, non-CO₂ GHGs, technology implementation, and economic considerations. The quarterly journal will be available in print and online, with online submissions and peer review, and an international board of editors.
Online via ScienceDirect in 2007 at: www.sciencedirect.com. See: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijggc.

6) Release of the Film "An Inconvenient Truth." Coinciding with the May 24, 2006 release of Al Gore's book on global warming, An Inconvenient Truth, is the showing of the film production by the same name. The film was released in Los Angeles and New York with expansion to other theaters to occur in June 2006.
 To locate a theater or watch the film trailer, go to: http://www.climatecrisis.net.

7) "Livermore Lab's 'Nanotube' Work Could Help Curb Global Warming." Scientists from Lawrence Livermore and Lawrence Berkeley laboratories have created a filtration membrane comprised of carbon nanotubes, which could be useful for removing carbon dioxide directly from power plant emissions. The carbon nanotubes that comprise the membrane are 50,000 times thinner than a human hair and over a trillion microscopic pores per square inch, but have a greater than expected flow rate for gasses and liquids passing through it. The research team is not sure of why the rate is faster than one would expect, but postulated that it is because the carbon atoms that make up the tubes fit together perfectly, and the surface of the tubes is extremely slippery. The technical paper describing the nanotubes transport process is in the May 19, 2006 issue of Science. ("Fast Mass Transport Through Sub-2-Nanometer Carbon Nanotubes, Science, May 19, 2006, Vol. 312. no. 5776, pp. 1034 - 1037, doi:10.1126/science.1126298.) May 19, 2006

8) "In situ CO₂-coal reactions in view of carbon dioxide storage in deep unminable coal seams." Injection of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in coalbed is considered to be an attractive option for storage. Large amounts of carbon dioxide are generated during the burial history of coal. In commercially produced coalbed gas, however, only small amounts of CO₂ are found. This has motivated the present investigation of the long-term stability of sequestered CO₂ in coal seams. Thus, the purpose of this study is to examine whether reactions with carbon dioxide can occur in coal at reservoir temperatures. The question is whether a relatively small decomposition of CO₂ to form carbon monoxide (CO) can become significant in periods of 10,000 years. High pressure high temperature static and dynamic experiments with CO2 and coal were performed, which led to the opinion that chemical reactions involving CO2 cannot be ruled out. All CO concentrations from CO₂ dynamic pressure experiments appear elevated compared to the nitrogen dynamic pressure experiment. The experiments do strongly point towards the reactivity of CO₂ to form CO but because of limited experimental data the chemical involvement cannot be articulated in detail.
Fuel, Volume 85, Issues 12-13 , September 2006, Pages 1904-1912.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6V3B-4JRV77S-5/2/63e5f8cc6f3b7f9d4e073201bc08adfe

9) This item was sent by Fatosh Gozalpour and Patrick Corbett (Heriot-Watt University), UK-Scotland representatives in ENeRG.

ENeRG, the European Network for Research in Geo-energy, was created in 1993 by European organisations involved in research and technology development (RTD) focused on fossil energy sources, especially oil and gas. It was formed to promote European RTD capability in the service of Europe's geo-energy exploration and production industry and its associated service and supply sector. ENeRG has members in 24 countries and it operates as an "informal club". The Aim of ENeRG is to promote industry orientated research, development and demonstration to meet the future challenges. It also works to establish a platform to develop wider and deeper co-operation in RTD between RTD organisations and industry at the European level.

The Goal of ENeRG is the promotion of co-operation between European organisations engaged in research and technological development relevant to exploration and production of geo-energy. The main objectives of ENeRG are: · To identify and match opportunities and requirements for new RTD programmes which will bring benefits to European industry · To explore and promote where appropriate co-ordinated views of its Members on R&D issues · To promote scientific and technical collaboration between Members ("broker" for international consortia) · To promote capability of Members to meet future needs of European industry · To monitor and advise on EU's R&D related legislation and policy · To inform/advise Members on EU's R&D programmes · To promote the transfer of European know-how and technology to third countries The Newsletter of the ENeRG Network, issue No.13: June 2006 is attached. It is appreciated if you can circulate the issue in your institute or simply pass the Newsletter to your librarian. The previous issues of the Newsletter can be found at ENeRG's homepage http://www.energnet.com/.