CCUS 2019: Capturing The Clean Growth Opportunities

Ambition, leadership and scale are essential if the UK is going to capitalise on the opportunities presented by carbon capture, usage and storage (CCUS), delegates heard yesterday at CCUS 2019: Capturing the clean growth opportunities.

The conference, hosted by the Carbon Capture and Storage Association (CCSA), brought together nearly 200 people from the CCUS sector, including industry providers, potential customers, policymakers, investors and researchers.

The development of Carbon Capture Usage and Storage (CCUS) is a priority infrastructure challenge for the UK and a central pillar of the Government’s industrial strategy, clean growth and low carbon policies. The Climate Change Committee has identified the vital role that CCUS needs to play in the journey to decarbonisation; Chris Stark, the Committee’s Chief Executive, reinforced this at the conference, saying “Let’s bury the idea that CCUS is a fantasy… CCUS is absolutely essential to meet the net zero target.”

The change in our energy sector over the last decade has been dramatic but the transformation to a net-zero world will be unprecedented. CCUS is essential to ensure that the energy transition will benefit every part of the economy, going further into power as well as industry and – through the production of clean hydrogen – the heating and transport sectors.

Keynote speaker, Liv Hovem, CEO of Oil and Gas for DNV GL, said that “we need more low carbon technologies to meet the Paris Agreement and this requires strong policies.”

The rollout of CCUS in the UK requires the rapid development of a huge new industry whilst its global potential provides the UK with opportunities for international leadership and creating new markets for services and the supply chain. Conference speakers reflected on the importance of central support for innovation and the creation of strong deployment links between innovators and markets. Discussions explored how the UK can take advantage of the sizeable global opportunity for CCUS. With the UK hosting COP26 next year, this presents a golden opportunity to show global leadership on CCUS and hydrogen; the UK can take the lead on a new green industrial revolution and demonstrate to the world its commitment to delivering net zero. As Theo Mitchell, Senior Advisor to the Bellona Foundation, noted: “In the context of climate change, every month and every choice matters.”

CCUS 2019 was sponsored by DNV GL, BP, Drax, ERM and Shell.

Presentations from the conference are available for download here.