Canada’s New $25-million Clean Energy Innovation Program Will Fund New Tech for CCUS

The Government of Canada is looking for projects to receive funding under a new program designed to accelerate commercialization of greenhouse gas reduction technologies.

The Clean Energy Innovation Program will divide $25 million over five areas, including carbon capture, use and storage.

“R&D activities in this area will help reduce capture costs and improve efficiency to help deploy this technology more broadly ─ paving the way for significant emission reduction,” Natural Resources Canada says.

“Carbon capture, use and storage will help meet Canada’s 2030 emission reduction targets. This will particularly be the case in the oil and gas, and industrial sectors.”

There are CCS projects around the world that have been operating for decades, including the Sleipner field off the coast of Norway where, according to project partner ExxonMobil, over one million tonnes of CO₂ have been re-injected each year since 1998. However, CCS technology is very much still in evolution, and some applications are brand new.

The oilsands industry marked a major milestone in November 2015 with the official opening of Shell Canada’s $1.35-billion Quest CCS project, the first to operate using CO₂ from oilsands operations. The project, which captures CO₂ from Shell’s Scotford upgrader, has $745 million in funding from the Alberta government and $120 million in funding from Ottawa, and is viewed as pivotal for ongoing development of CCS technology.

Canada’s new Clean Energy Innovation Program is also looking for projects developing renewable, smart grid and storage systems, reducing diesel use by industrial operators in northern and remote communities, addressing methane and volatile organic compounds, improving industrial efficiency and reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the building sector.

The program will fund R&D projects and front-end engineering design (FEED) studies at a maximum of $5 million per project. (JWN Energy)