Abby L. Harvey
GHG Monitor
1/23/2015
A group of four European utility companies are pulling out of the Zero Emissions Platform (ZEP), an advisory group to the European Commission on carbon capture and storage, because of concerns over the cost of the technology. The utilities, Germany’s RWE AG, France’s Electricite de France, Sweden’s Vattenfall AB and Spain’s Gas Natural Fenosa, wrote in a Jan. 12 letter to ZEP that they “currently do not have the necessary economic framework conditions in Europe to make CCS an attractive technology to invest in.” Representatives from the utilities did not respond to requests for comment this week.
The utility group also cited a departure from research and development type activities within ZEP as a contributing factor for their decision to leave the group. “Over the last months ZEP has focused more and more on lobbying positions rather than on technology issues and legal barriers, which are the essence of a technology platform like ZEP. However, positions on non technical issues are more and more diverging between the different constituency groups of ZEP and we find ourselves more and more in discussions about positioning of ZEP beyond promotion of CCS,” the group wrote.
ZEP said this week that it is disappointed by the utilities’ decision, but stressed that it will continue to operate as usual. “We remain committed to furthering the development of this crucial climate mitigation technology and are confident in our ability to reinforce our membership with like-minded companies and organizations that share the same interests on CCS and the goals of the ZEP Technology Platform,” ZEP said in a statement. “CCS is widely recognised as a critical technology for achieving Europe’s 80-95% decarbonisation targets by 2050 while contributing to energy security and preserving jobs and economic competitiveness,” ZEP said.
NGO Criticizes Utilities Over Move
Norwegian environmental group Bellona, a member of ZEP, criticized the utilities for their decision. “As opposed to how some would make it out, we do not believe this has to do with any perceived low viability of CCS technology – quite the contrary: The utilities see CCS as ever more likely, and given the precarious state of their business model, want a public bail out in the form of capacity payments without making any commitments to CCS,” Marika Andersen, EU Policy & Communication Advisor with Bellona, told GHG Monitor in a written response this week. “Hence they have now left ZEP, but established a utilities-only CCS ‘task force’ (run by their Brussels-lobby Eurelectric) in order to not ‘loose face’ on their efforts to deploy the only technology that can reduce their emissions. This task force will no doubt soon call for capacity payments,” she said. “We therefore think the utilities, with this move, have revealed an already poorly disguised effort to save their own skin, at the cost of European tax payers and climate ambition.”
Eurelectric announced its task force last week. “To reflect and reinforce the European electricity industry’s commitment to CCS, EURELECTRIC is establishing a CCS task force. This dedicated expert group will act as the power industry’s voice on CCS towards policymakers and regulators and will look at the necessary policy measures to ensure that this important technology can be commercialised in Europe,” Eurelectic said in a release.
In their letter, the group of utilities noted the current status of energy markets and stated the possibility of joining a CCS platform again the future. “We are aware, that CCS enjoys increasing awareness in both [the European Parliament] and [the European Commission], however we do not believe that this will drive large scale development of CCS in Europe in the near term due to the current development in the energy markets leaving utilities with restricted time and budget,” the group wrote. “In the expectation of more favorable energy market conditions in a near future in Europe, we would be happy to join a technology platform on CCS again.”
