As of September 30, 2016, the Carbon Capture and Sequestration Technologies program at MIT has closed. The website is being kept online as a reference but will not be updated.

Longannet Fact Sheet: Carbon Dioxide Capture and Storage Project

Company/Alliance: ScottishPower, Shell, National Grid and Aker Clean Carbon

Location: Firth of Forth, Fife, Scotland, UK

Feedstock: Coal

Size: 330 MW

Capture Technology: Post-combustion (Aker Clean Carbon's technology)

CO2 Fate: Sequestration in the North Sea depleted oil and gas fields via Shell's Goldeneye platform

Timing: Cancelled Previous start date (2014)

Motivation/Economics:

The project is waiting to hear on the decision taken by the UK government if it will receive the funding. E.ON pulled out of the Kingsnorth project (October 2010) leaving Longannet as the only remaining competitor for the UK CCS project. Provided all the requirements are met, Longannet will receive the £1 billion in capital expenditure for the first UK commercial-scale CCS demonstration project. ScottishPower was one of 9 UK projects to apply for EU funding of NER300 funding – a €4.4 billion fund earmarked to help support CCS and renewable energy projects (February 2011).

Comments:

On October 19, 2011 it was announced that the Longannet CCS project had been officially cancelled. The UK government announced "a decision has been made not to proceed with Longannet but to pursue other projects with the £1bn funding made available by the government." Longannet was the last remaining project in the UK government's competition for CCS funding.

Earlier in October 2011, it had emerged that talks between the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and ScottishPower had run into trouble over commercial viability without more public financing (£1.5 billion was requested). ScottishPower, and its partners Shell and the National Grid, had also recently completed a detailed study of the project and had deep concerns about its commercial viability without heavier public backing.

In May 2009 Scottish Energy began a small 1 MW demo capture project which successfully captured over 90%. Shell and Petrofac had agreed on a CO2 storage plan if Longannet was successful on winning the UK CCS grant. The CO2 would be piped to an existing gas processing facility before being piped offshore to Shell's Goldeneye Gas Platform.

Project Link: ScottishPower website

Other Sources and Press Releases:

Scottish Government’s green energy vision (May 2015)
ScottishPower Comment: Longannet Power Station (March 2015)
Heated politics of Longannet going cold (March 2015)
Aker Clean Carbon
Longannet carbon capture project cancelled (October 2011)
Flagship UK carbon capture project 'close to collapse' (October 2011)
ScottishPower applies for EU NER300 CCS funding (February 2011)
Climate groups back Longannet (December 2010)
E.ON pulls out of Kinsgnorth CCS project (October 2010)
Longannet tipped to receive funding (March 2010)
Longannet at center of Scottish Energy green plants (January 2009)