Martin Schneider
GHG Monitor
3/14/2014
Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead (R) signed into law last week a bill providing $15 million for a new carbon capture and storage test center that would explore novel uses for captured CO2 and develop new markets for carbon. The bill provides the $15 million contingent upon the state receiving $5 million in “other than state funds” for costs associated with design, construction or operation of the test center. “Wyoming and many private companies have invested significantly in carbon capture and sequestration research. I want to advance the conversation to look at what happens when CCS technology is commercially viable and to try to add value to CO2, which has significant potential as a resource,” Mead said earlier this year in requesting the funds for the center.
The test center as proposed would be used by competitors seeking to win a proposed $10 million inducement prize—an idea that has been touted for several years by Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, a Colorado-based non-profit wholesale power supplier that has also been a prime mover in developing the proposal for the CCS test center. Tri-State has been trying to raise money for the total cost of the so-called X Prize, which it hopes could stimulate a new market surrounding carbon capture and utilization technologies.
Notably, the appropriation of the funds is also contingent on Advanced Conversion Technologies Task Force at the University of Wyoming’s School of Energy Resources receiving a commitment from one or more “able partners to share equitably with the state of Wyoming in the operational expenses of the test center” and establishing a “cooperative effort for the construction, management and operation of the facility between any institution, instrumentality or political subdivision of the state and any accepted partner in the test facility.” The Act also notes that the Governor may “prohibit or suspend expenditure of the funds” if he determines that the center is not:
- Increasing the knowledge base within the state of Wyoming on the capture, sequestration and management of carbon emissions from coal fired power plants with the potential benefit of improving the future marketability of Wyoming carbon based energy sources
- Increasing the national and international exposure of the state of Wyoming and its institutions, instrumentalities and political subdivisions as participants and locations for innovation in the use of energy;
- Adding ancillary or supplemental value to Wyoming products or by-products; or
- Inducing the development of methods or products which may advance the future use of Wyoming carbon based natural resources.
The bill adds: “The proposed use of these funds shall be reviewed by the attorney general and the attorney general shall first determine that the use is lawful. The governor shall additionally determine that the construction of the test center will result in substantial benefit to the public.”
Wyoming Seeks Capture Technologies
Rob Hurless, Energy Strategy Advisor to Gov. Mead and Deputy Director of the Carbon Management Institute at the School of Energy Resources at the University of Wyoming, told GHG Monitor earlier this year that researchers at the test center could explore ways to separate and capture CO2 and develop new uses for that CO2. Those uses would include development of the CO2 into beneficial products at utility scale. “In a place like Wyoming, where we’re CO2 short, we also have lots of coal plants [where] there’s some amount of CO2 going up the stack,” Hurless said. “So the first part of this is to say, OK, what technologies work best to capture that CO2 and make it ready, make it available for Enhanced Oil Recovery? The longer term goal is to say, OK, what can you do after you’ve captured CO2, what are the technologies that you can employ to turn that CO2 from a waste that people are thinking has to be sequestered into beneficial products that actually provide potentially a revenue stream to the utility and also address the issue of emissions? That’s what’s intriguing about this notion. And certainly if there were existing technologies people would be all over them because the important thing is not only to create that beneficial use, but create it at utility scale. This is a serious challenge but it’s certainly worth making the effort in our view.”
