Exxon has announced a new Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for one of the world’s largest carbon capture hubs planned to date. The oil major signed a deal with Shell, CNOOC, and Guangdong Provincial Development and Reform Commission to explore the feasibility of developing a carbon capture and storage (CCS) hub in China.
The hub will be located at the Daya Bay National Economic and Technological Development Zone in Huizhou, Guangdong Province. It will sequester 10 million tonnes of CO2 a year and if successful, will be China’s first offshore large-scale CCS hub.
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It aims to serve the decarbonization needs of the industrial zone and help reduce significant emissions of the Daya Bay National Economic and Technological Development Zone. Shell and Cnooc already jointly operate a plant in the industrial petrochemical park while Exxon decided to invest in a complex last year before taking part in the carbon capture initiative.
Following the MoU, the four parties will seek to conduct a joint study to assess the technical solution, develop the commercial model and work with the government to develop enabling policies.
There is no information so far on the schedule for when the investment decision will be made, the cost of the project, or when construction would commence. The proposed project, however, is considered to be capable of making a significant contribution towards reducing China’s carbon footprint as it would capture about 0.1% of the country’s annual emissions.
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“China has an ambitious decarbonization path – from about 10 billion tons of CO2 emissions a year to net-zero within 30 years… A shift to cleaner energy sources and energy efficiency will not be enough. China will also need to actively remove emissions. This makes CCS an essential part of the solution for China…,” said Jason Wong, Executive Chairman of Shell Companies in China.
Developing large-scale carbon capture and storage hubs is working well for the industry that is trying to increase efficiency and the economic appeal of carbon capture technologies. Major hubs are achieving better emissions cuts as all industrial plants are located close to each other. Permanent storage infrastructure also secures emissions of hard-to-decarbonize sectors in the short-term are taken care of.
