With the carbon capture and storage (CCS) demonstration plant, in full-scale operation no later than 2015, Vattenfall is hoping to take another important step towards commercial implementation of CCS technology. The investment is estimated to be around E1 billion.
The Janschwalde lignite power plant consists of six 500MW blocks. For the demonstration plant, one of the blocks, consisting of two boilers, will be equipped with CCS technology. One boiler will be newly built with oxy-fuel technology while another one will be retrofitted with post-combustion technology.
Vattenfall has said that the world’s first pilot plant for CO2-seperation will be inaugurated in Schwarze Pumpe, in the Brandenberg state, in summer 2008. This pilot plant will have an installed thermal capacity of 30MW and aims to optimize the oxy-fuel process, which has been successfully tested on a laboratory scale. Vattenfall is investing about E70 million to build this pilot plant.
Tuomo Hatakka, CEO of Vattenfall Europe, said: Fossil fuels can be high-tech, and do have a great future. The emission problem can be solved, and by solving it Vattenfall will establish itself once again as a technological leader in terms of CCS.
