Norway to lead European CCS research effort

The European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) has approved €81 million in funding for nine countries' coordinated research projects in carbon capture and storage.

Under the European Carbon Dioxide Capture and Storage Laboratory Infrastructure initiative, 15 laboratories are planned to be built in the participating countries.

Norway is expected to host five of the labs at Trondheim in the north of the country. Norway is also receiving a third of the total project funding.

Norway has said it would spend more than NOK 300 million on research and development of cost-effective carbon capture programs (see Norway group to spend $59M on carbon capture).

Two of the Norwegian labs will focus on CO₂ scrubbing and on low-temperature separation technologies from power station flue gases. The two labs are projected to cost €23 million.

The other labs are planned for Germany, France, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Hungary, Poland, Croatia and Denmark to investigate storage technology, improved combustion and best practices.

ESFRI was founded in 2002 to coordinate investment research in Europe.

The initiative is to be coordinated by the Norwegian University of Science and Technology and independent research organisation SINTEF.

Researchers across the globe are trying out different techniques to sequester and remove carbon emissions. In February 2008, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, said they found a way to filter greenhouse gases from power plants by using creating crystal structures that can selectively capture carbon dioxide (see Carbon capture gets crystal powered).

A government-backed project in Canada by Houston-based Spectra Energy said in May it was researching whether deep underground saline reservoirs were appropriate for carbon capture and storage (see Spectra Energy looking at carbon capture in Canada).

And some companies, such as Halifax, Nova Scotia-based Carbon Sense Solutions and Los Gatos, Calif.-based Calera, are developing methods to convert carbon into a material that can be used to make concrete (see Capturing carbon with concrete).