Abby L. Harvey
GHG Daily
1/27/2016
CO2 Solutions said Monday that its carbon capture demonstration project at Salaberry-de-Valleyfield, near Montreal, Québec, has concluded and met expectations. According to the results of the demonstration, the company’s proprietary enzyme, 1T1, performed in a stable manner and did not produce any toxic waste. Furthermore, the technology produced CO2 suitable for food, beverages, and other reuse applications, according to a CO2 Solutions release.
The company also noted that the unit ran cheaply. After having the results independently reviewed by an outside contractor, the company confirmed that core process capture costs for a 1,250 tonne-CO2/day scale were $28 per tonne, in line with earlier published estimates. Notably, the capture costs reported come in below the province of Alberta’s $30 per tonne carbon tax. “We believe we have an industry leading cost position right now with our process and as well as certainly the environmental aspects of our technology in terms of avoiding the types of waste products and aerosol emissions you encounter with the use of amines, we’ve eliminated that issue as well,” Jonathan A. Carley, vice-president of business development with CO2 Solutions told GHG Daily.
“The completion of the project and the independent engineering review confirm the low cost and environmentally sustainable nature of our technology, both of which are key differentiators in our industry” CO2 Solutions President and CEO Evan Price said in the release. “We have now proven the robustness and operability of our technology in a real-life, industrial-scale setting, which puts applications for carbon mitigation and beneficial reuse of CO2 squarely in our sights. These results will now be used to move forward prospective customer and partner opportunities currently under discussion.”
The project has gone through a number of changes since its inception. CO2 Solutions initially tested its enzyme-enabled carbon capture technology at the University of North Dakota’s Energy & Environmental Research Center (EERC). Due to better than expected test results at EERC, the company moved its timeline for demonstration forward. The project was originally slated to run for 2,500 hours at Husky Energy’s Pikes Peak South, Saskatchewan, heavy-oil site. In May, the company began testing at Valleyfield and subsequently decided to perform all testing there to avoid the additional cost of relocation.
