PCC projects to tackle climate change

As the need to clean up the use of fossil fuels continues to gain attention, CSIRO’s Energy Transformed Flagship has been working on a range of Post Combustion Capture (PCC) projects to help tackle climate change. 

PCC is a process that captures carbon dioxide from power station flue gases and is a key technology that can potentially reduce carbon dioxide emissions from existing and future coal-fired power stations by more than 85 per cent.

Stream Leader, Dr Paul Feron, said important progress was being made on the PCC projects underway.

“This month we will move the existing pilot plant to Loy Yang Power Station in Victoria, where it will operate on a flue gas slipstream,” Dr Feron said.

This is part of the Latrobe Valley PCC project supported by the Victorian Government through the Energy Technology Innovation Strategy and by Loy Yang Power.

Work is also progressing on three clean coal projects under the Asia Pacific Partnership for Clean Development and Climate (APP) projects.

“We’re working on a pilot plant program with Delta at Munmorah power station, south of Newcastle,” Dr Feron said.

“This program will be based on ammonia, rather than amines, for the capture of CO₂. It is therefore a completely different pilot plant design and is due to be delivered in May or June this year.

“We’ll also be establishing another pilot plant in Queensland which will be based on amines and will commence in 2008.”

But the Flagship’s PCC projects aren’t restricted to Australia. Work is also continuing with foreign partners, the China Huaneng Group and the Thermal Power Research Institute, to set up a PCC pilot plant at the Goabeidian Power Station in Beijing.

“This project will also focus on assessing the performance of an amine-based PCC pilot plant, but under Chinese conditions.”

The project is significant because it allows PCC technology to be progressed in the Chinese energy sector which is both a large and growing contributor to world greenhouse gas emissions and participation in this project will have a much greater impact than operating in Australia alone.

“Our Chinese partners are aiming for the Beijing pilot plant to be up and running before August this year,” Dr Feron said.

The Flagship goal in all of these projects is to provide proof of the PCC concept, evaluate various absorbents, assist in the scale up to demonstration and commercial size plants, demonstrate further development potential and provide the science underpinnings for future policy options for CO₂ capture.