The project organisation Porthos has signed an agreement with four companies to work in parallel over the coming nine months on preparations for the capture, transport and storage of CO₂, in line with the Netherlands’ goals to significantly reduce GHG emissions.
The four companies are ExxonMobil, Shell, Air Liquide and Air Products. The capture is to take place at these refineries and hydrogen producers in Rotterdam.
Transport to and storage beneath the North Sea is being prepared by Porthos, a project organisation from EBN, Gasunie and the Port of Rotterdam Authority.
CCS (Carbon Capture and Storage) is an important element in achieving the Dutch Climate Agreement objectives. It is also needed for the production of climate-neutral blue hydrogen, which will enable the hydrogen economy to get off the ground quickly.
Namely, the project is in line with the Netherlands’ climate objectives to reduce emission of greenhouse gases by 49% by 2030 and by 95% by 2050 compared with 1990.
Porthos has now started with the FEED phase. Several millions of euros will be spent on technical preparations in this phase.
That is why it is desirable that Porthos has a form of commitment from the business sector that they will actually use the CO₂ infrastructure.
At the same time, Porthos has committed itself to continuing preparations for the transport and storage of CO₂ beneath the North Sea.
According to the timeframe, by September 2020 an SDE++ tender, the national programme for CO₂ reduction, will start. SDE++ subsidy is required in order to bridge the difference in costs for ETS and the total costs for capture, transport and storage of CO₂.
Whether this subsidy will be awarded and how the financial outline will look for all involved parties is expected to be known by early 2021.
Companies will then have to take the final decision to capture CO₂ and deliver it to Porthos. It will be possible to store the first CO₂ beneath the North Sea by end 2023.
Porthos stands for Port of Rotterdam CO₂ Transport Hub and Offshore Storage.
