Tamar Hallerman
GHG Monitor
10/19/12
PITTSBURGH—The future of carbon capture and storage is “directly linked” to the development and deployment of the technology in China, and U.S. companies should look to develop partnerships there, a former Republican chairman of the House Science Committee said here this week. In a keynote address at the Internatinoal Pittsburgh Coal Conference, retired Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (N.Y.), who served in the House of Representatives from 1983 to 2007 and was a key architect of the Clean Air Act amendments of 1990, said that American energy companies should aim to form CCS technology development partnerships with Chinese companies similar to what Duke Energy has forged with China Huaneng Group in recent years. “I believe these types of collaboration on commercial-scale CCS hold the key to the deployment of CCS globally,” he said. While presenting a paper he co-wrote, Boehlert repeatedly underscored that it “makes economic sense” for American companies to invest in China now. “I firmly believe that initiating CCS projects in China today makes eminent economic and environmental sense for China and the international community,” he said.
During his speech, Boehlert emphasized that the development and deployment of CCS technology is “one of the scientific and policy imperatives of our time.” However, he added that developing the technology in the U.S. has become too difficult and expensive due to various political, economic and regulatory realities, perhaps most notably the continued availability of cheap natural gas, as well as the lack of a federal carbon policy to drive investment. Instead, Boehlert recommended that American energy companies look to China to test the technology. He said China is an ideal environment to develop partnerships due to its sizable coal reserves, lower construction costs, relatively lax regulatory environment and geology suitable for CO2 storage, not to mention its desire to develop CCS projects and clean up emissions as indicated in its most recent Five-Year Plan. “Rather than the traditional model of the Chinese importing the results of western research and development, western multinationals must reinvent the traditional model and localize greater research and development in China, importing the results west,” he said. Boehlert cited a June Congressional Budget Office report that suggested, among many options, that the U.S. work with countries like China to develop CCS technology rather than move forward on its own.
Several American Companies Look East
Duke and Huaneng are not the only U.S.-China partnership in the CCS industry. Summit Power Group recently signed a memorandum of understanding with the Beijing-based Sinopec Engineering Group and the Export-Import Bank of China to move forward on developing its Texas Clean Energy Project in the West Permian Basin. In May, the Beijing-based National Institute of Clean and Low Carbon Energy announced that it would be joining the FutureGen Alliance in part to gain knowledge about oxy-combustion capture. Last year, the French company Alstom paired up with China Datang Corp. to develop two enhanced oil recovery-based CCS projects in eastern China. Other American companies such as American Electric Power, GE and Babcock & Wilcox have also made significant investments in the country to develop CCS in recent years. “International energy companies are learning what the pharmaceutical industry learned many years ago: that China provides many advantages to those seeking to develop innovative products,” Boehlert said. The American government has also started its own high-level knowledge-sharing agreements with China through the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum and the U.S.-China Clean Energy Research Center, as well as through avenues like the International Energy Agency.
The Accord Group’s Jeffery More, who co-authored the paper and previously worked with Boehlert as a staffer on the House Transportation Committee’s Water Resources and Environment Subcommittee, acknowledged in subsequent remarks that there are some issues that remain in terms of working with China, including intellectual property rights. “There are a number of major issues to doing work in China that aren’t unique to CCS or the energy industry,” he said. “Those things need to be worked out, but if we do believe that [carbon emissions] are one of the world’s largest environmental challenges, if we do believe that our energy security matters as much as we should, we ought to see a level of investment and focus by these large governments and companies into developing these technologies.”