New 'Scottish Cluster' promotes CCS, hydrogen
Acorn CCS and Hydrogen Project Partners are spearheading a new "Scottish Cluster" of manufacturers and other emitters to lobby harder for carbon capture and storage (CCS), hydrogen use and other ways of decarbonising industry.
"Back the Scottish cluster" brings together distilleries, chemicals and others in order to make the case for CCS, hydrogen and low carbon technologies such as direct air capture of CO2 in order to achieve net-zero targets. Scotland's top emitting sectors are responsible for 9mn metric tons of CO2....
The Acorn CCS project, led by Storegga, Shell and Harbour Energy, is hoped to provide critical backbone infrastructure for the Scottish Cluster by the middle of the decade. It will collect emissions at St Fergus (pictured) and reinject them offshore, and also convert natural gas delivered at the beach and reform it into more CO2 for injection; and blue hydrogen.
Norwegian Equinor and SSE are considering a plan to capture emissions from a projected gas-fired plant and deliver it to Acorn.
The UK government's Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) has said it will provide £1bn to support the development of four CO2 capture and storage clusters across the UK by the end of the decade as part of its Ten Point Plan to reach net zero climate targets by 2050.
Storegga CEO Nick Cooper said the campaign "unifies the voices of Scottish industry and will look to highlight the importance of CCS, hydrogen and other low carbon technologies in Scotland to aid the country, the UK and Europe in tackling climate change and meeting net zero goals at the same time as creating and preserving jobs in industries which struggle to decarbonise totally."
Other terminals may also become centres for blue hydrogen and CCS: Theddlethorpe and Bacton, delivery points for southern North Sea gas, have both attracted interest.