ecoENERGY Technology Initiative Call for Proposals

The $230-million ecoENERGY Technology initiative was launched in 2007 to support the development of technologies to increase Canada's supply of clean energy, reduce energy waste and reduce the environmental impact of the production and use of conventional energy. It is one of a series of ecoENERGY initiatives through which the Government of Canada is investing a total of $3.6 billion to work with Canadians to increase production of cleaner energy and cleaner fuels and increase energy efficiency.

The eight successful projects were selected in response to a call for proposals issued by the Government of Canada in April of 2008. Under the ecoENERGY Technology initiative, up to $140 million will be invested in these projects to support industry-led research, development and demonstration of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies.

The Government of Canada will now invite the project proponents to begin negotiations toward formal contribution agreements to set the conditions under which funding will be delivered. The funding amounts are expected to range from $3 million to $30 million for each project.

Successful Project Descriptions

Heartland Area Redwater Project (HARP)

Lead proponent: ARC Resources
Source: Industrial facilities
Area: Fort Saskatchewan-Heartland-Redwater area in central Alberta

Purpose: This project is designed to demonstrate the feasibility of safe CO2 storage in the Redwater Leduc Reef, situated northeast of Edmonton, Alberta. This site is located close to the Alberta Industrial Heartland region, where there are a number of large industrial sources of greenhouse gas emissions, including chemical and fertilizer plants and several oil sands upgraders that are operating, being built or in the planning stages.

The Redwater Leduc Reef is also strategically located along a straight-line path between Fort McMurray and Edmonton, a potential route for a CO2 pipeline from Fort McMurray. Preliminary work estimates the total storage capacity of the saline aquifer portion of the reef to be one gigatonne of CO2.

Over the long term, this project will demonstrate carbon capture and storage on a commercial scale (several million tonnes per year), contributing to a significant reduction in GHG emissions.

Integrated Carbon Capture and Enhanced Oil Recovery

Lead proponent: Enhance Energy
Source: Large fertilizer plant and an oil sands upgrading operation
Area: Alberta Industrial Heartland, northeast of Edmonton

Purpose: This project involves the capture of CO2 emissions from industrial sites in the Alberta Industrial Heartland. The captured CO2 will be transported to mature oil reservoirs in central Alberta, where it will be injected for enhanced oil recovery purposes and permanent sequestration. The project will capture CO2 from two sources: a large fertilizer plant and an oil sands upgrading operation (awaiting construction) in order to demonstrate the feasibility of a single network to collect CO2 from a large number of industrial emitters. This technology could be applied to many similar geological reservoirs throughout Alberta that are each capable of sequestering millions of tonnes of CO2.

Within five years, this project could capture and sequester up to 1.9 megatonnes of CO2 annually, which is the equivalent of taking 358,000 cars off the road each year. There is a long-term potential for the capture and storage of up to 15 megatonnes of CO2 annually. The project could also lead to the recovery of significant amounts of oil that cannot be reached by conventional methods.

Fort Nelson Exploratory Project

Lead proponent: Spectra Energy Transmission
Source: Natural gas processing plant
Area: Fort Nelson, B.C.

Purpose: This project represents the first phase of research toward a world-scale carbon capture and storage project associated with Spectra Energy's existing gas processing plant in Fort Nelson, B.C. Raw natural gas contains high levels of CO2, which processing strips away. If proven feasible, the CO2 would be compressed, dehydrated, cooled into a concentrated stream and then injected into deep saline formations more than two kilometres underground for permanent sequestration.

This project is designed to demonstrate the technical feasibility of injecting large volumes of sour CO2 into deep saline formations for permanent storage. In the long term, it could lead to a reduction of 1.3 to 1.6 megatonnes of CO2 per year.

Pioneer Project

Lead proponent: TransAlta
Source: Coal-fired power plant
Area: 70 km west of Edmonton, Alberta

Purpose: Pioneer is a large-scale carbon capture and storage project proposed for the Keephills Thermal Electric Power Generation Plant.

TransAlta is proposing to construct one of the world's first large-scale CCS facilities that will perform several functions: integrate leading-edge, post-combustion, chilled ammonia capture technology with a power plant to capture one megatonne per year of CO2; transport the CO2 for use in enhanced oil recovery and to a permanent geological storage site; demonstrate safe, secure, large-scale permanent storage in saline aquifers; and deliver significant reductions in CO2 emissions by 2012.

Belle Plaine Integrated Polygeneration CCS Project

Lead Proponent: TransCanada
Source: Electricity power plant
Area: Belle Plaine, Saskatchewan

Purpose: This project proposes to conduct pre-front end engineering and design and other work as a prerequisite to a decision to go forward with a $5-billion project to build and commission a polygeneration facility in Belle Plaine, Saskatchewan. If the facility is constructed, large volumes of petcoke (a low-value product of heavy oil upgrading) would be gasified and used to produce a number of products, including hydrogen, steam and sulphur, and to generate up to 500 MW in electricity to potentially displace aging coal-fired generation stations in Saskatchewan. Process CO2 would also be used by two large fertilizer plants located near the proposed polygeneration facility.

Reductions in CO2 emissions would result from capturing and sequestering 80-90 percent of the CO2 from the polygeneration facility, as well as from offsetting the use of natural gas to produce hydrogen and steam at the fertilizer plants. Captured CO2 would be sequestered at enhanced oil recovery sites and in saline aquifers in southeastern Saskatchewan.

CO2 Injection in Heavy Oil Reservoirs

Lead Proponent: Husky Energy Inc.
Source: Oil upgrader and ethanol plant
Area: Lloydminster, Saskatchewan

Purpose: This project will focus on targeted R&D activities to develop new knowledge and methods for enhanced oil recovery in heavy oil reservoirs, using injected CO2 that could be permanently stored in the reservoirs, a new approach in heavy oil extraction. This work will help lead to the capture of CO2 from Husky's upgrader and ethanol plant and transport and inject it into heavy oil reservoirs located adjacent to the upgrader to enhance oil recovery.

This project could lead to the collection of 300,000 tonnes of CO2 per year from the Husky Upgrader and ethanol plant by purifying, dehydrating, compressing and transporting the CO2 to a heavy oil reservoir in the Lloydminster area.

Alberta Saline Aquifer Project (ASAP) / Genesee Post-Combustion Demonstration Plant

Lead proponents: Enbridge and EPCOR

NOTE: As these two projects are designed to integrate with one another, they have been combined for purposes of funding under the ecoENERGY Technology initiative.

Source: Coal-fired power plant
Area: West of Edmonton, Alberta

Purpose: EPCOR's Genesee Post-Combustion Demonstration Plant involves the construction of a demonstration facility that will capture CO2 from a greenfield coal-fired power plant (150 MW net) in Alberta. The captured CO2 will be transported through collaboration with Enbridge and the Alberta Saline Aquifer Project (ASAP).

Enbridge will be designing the pipeline route for transporting the CO2 as well as the CO2 injection facilities. The company will also conduct pilot injections to test the characteristics of the proposed storage site to optimize the project's operation.

The CO2 will be used for enhanced oil recovery operations or sequestered in a saline formation located within 100 km of Genesee. ASAP is also responsible for measuring and monitoring the CO2 that will be stored in the saline aquifer.

The Genesee plant would commence operation in 2015, capturing 3,000 tonnes of CO2 per day, or nearly one million tonnes per year.