Energy Post

The best thinkers on energy

INTERVIEW: ANDREA STEGHER Vice President International Gas Union “We need every instrument at our disposal to fight climate change”

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Energy Post's Matthew James talks to Andrea Stegher, Vice-President of the IGU about price caps, security of supply, CCUS, Markets and Renewable Gases ahead of our conference "The Future of Gas" tomorrow and Thursday online from 09:00 to 12:15 both days. You can REGISTER NOW. In the interview, Andrea talks about the importance of cooperation, innovation and above all a need to invest in all the instruments available to fight global warming - … [Read more...]

Carbon Capture is a risky decarbonisation pathway: 13 flagship projects reviewed

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The debate around the effectiveness of carbon capture (you can register now for our CCUS session on Wednesday at 10.45 - Editor) has led to polarising views. Although the first implementations began 50 years ago, serious efforts to capture large volumes cost-effectively are in their infancy and unproven at scale. Is it, given time and support, a solution to excess emissions worldwide? Or is it a distraction that will allow fossils to be used yet … [Read more...]

Engineered soil microbe can convert CO2 20 times faster than natural photosynthesis

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New research led by the U.S. Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology in Germany has shown how a bacterial enzyme found in the soil can be made to convert carbon dioxide into carbon compounds 20 times faster than plant enzymes do during natural photosynthesis. As Glennda Chui at Stanford University explains, it’s very early days but could open a door to artificially … [Read more...]

Event Summary: “CHINA: Carbon Neutral by 2060 – Innovation”

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Here are the highlights of our 2-day 4-session workshop “CHINA: Carbon Neutral by 2060 - Innovation”, compiled by Sara Stefanini. It’s a quick and efficient way for readers to see the main points made by our expert panellists. Held at the end of May, it was the fourth of our EU-China workshops since the first was held in November 2020, produced for the EU China Energy Cooperation Platform (ECECP). As always, leading speakers from the EU, major … [Read more...]

Biologically produced Ethylene for plastics can become a carbon capture leader

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Ethylene is a key component of the world’s vast appetite for plastics. It’s normally made using fossils as a feedstock, and is energy-intensive to produce. So the chemicals industry has long sought a way to biologically manufacture ethylene. It would be a double-win for clean energy: it would capture CO2 and displace the fossil-based feedstocks. Connor O’Neil at NREL describes new research that makes ethylene in a “one-step” process fuelled … [Read more...]

World’s biggest Carbon Capture project: Shute Creek’s “sell or vent” business model isn’t working

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ExxonMobil’s Shute Creek CCUS facility is the world’s largest carbon capture project. But since its launch in the 1980s half of that CO2 has been vented into the atmosphere, with most of the rest sold for pumping it underground to push out more oil from depleted wells (called Enhanced Oil Recovery). Only 3% has been sequestered underground, explain Bruce Robertson and Milad Mousavian at IEEFA, following their study based on publicly available … [Read more...]

Russia-Ukraine: Support for U.S. Oil & Gas producers must tie them to low-emissions investments

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Like many countries, the U.S. is set to raise oil and gas production to compensate for cuts in Russian imports consequent to the war in Ukraine. The danger is that short-term solutions to sky rocketing fossil fuel prices will take precedence over climate targets. But Ben Cahill at CSIS explains how this is an opportunity for the Biden administration to give support to fossil energy producers with one hand and extract solid commitments on … [Read more...]

Event summary: “Unlocking the potential of Bioenergy”

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Sara Stefanini provides a written summary of our panel discussion held on Thursday March 17th 2022. It’s a full summary of the 90 minute discussion (including audience questions), but it begins conveniently with a summary of the highlights (potential for bioenergy, hard-to-abate sectors, sustainability, policy needs). Those highlights include the need to scale bioenergy up from around 50 EJ today to 150 EJ by 2050; the importance of carbon … [Read more...]

Biomass for industrial heat

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On Thursday 17th March at 12.30CET our latest Energy Post panel, “Unlocking the potential of bioenergy” boasts representatives from two of the most challenging areas for decarbonisation: the cement and aviation industries. Taking part are  Winston Beck, Head of Government Affairs at HeidelbergCement and Laurent Donceel, Senior Policy Director at Airlines for Europe. They will be joined by Thomas Meth, Chief Commercial Officer at Enviva (event … [Read more...]

Converting captured CO2 directly into fuels could get simpler, cheaper

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Converting captured CO2 directly into fuels (or other products) at scale seems an effective way to mitigate emissions. But most of the conversion methods, including electrochemical, thermocatalytic, photothermal, or photochemical processes, have not proved very effective. David Chandler at MIT describes how researchers there have identified the main stumbling block and found a very simple solution. Basically, at the molecular level, the contact … [Read more...]

Energy Post Quiz 2021: ANSWERS

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Hope you all had fun with the Energy Post Quiz, published before the Christmas break. Here are the answers. There are ten questions, both entertaining and insightful. The answers could all be found in articles that appeared here during 2021, and we give you the links to them. During 2021 Energy Post had another strong year in terms of number of debates hosted, event attendance, and readership for our articles: our readership grew by … [Read more...]

Energy Post Quiz 2021

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Energy Post has had another strong year in terms of number of debates hosted, readership growth and event attendance. Our readership has grown by 17.16% year on year. We hosted 14 panel discussions (including 3 for ECECP with an average of 20 panellists from all corners of the globe). Together we've reached hundreds of thousands with our event packages. Our thanks to all our authors. Now, with all those parties cancelled due to Covid you have … [Read more...]

Will this be the decade of Carbon Capture or another false start?

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Ten years ago there was a major drive to get carbon capture off the ground. But only 30% of the earmarked $8.5bn worldwide was ever spent. Spending timescales were too short, deadlines were missed, projects were too focussed and too complex, and long-term liability was poorly understood and managed. This time it can be different, says Samantha McCulloch at the IEA who compares that faltering history with the plans now being put in place. New … [Read more...]

Renewed interest in Carbon Capture strategies for net-zero: targets, obstacles, costs, priorities

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Martina Lyons at IRENA picks out the highlights of their new report “Reaching Zero with Renewables: Capturing Carbon”. Carbon capture is going to be expensive, so should be focussed on hard-to-abate industrial sectors, as well as bioenergy plants. Lyons breaks down the target carbon capture volumes, costs and the investments required, as well as looking at the consequences of different strategies and carbon prices. Scaling up this technology, … [Read more...]

Will Wind & Solar confront its 10 challenges? If not, we need Nuclear, CCS, and more

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Wind and solar’s impressive cost declines have seen its welcome and rapid emergence. But currently they account for a mere 2–4% of global energy. So these variable renewable energy sources (VREs) must now address 10 big challenges if they are to dominate the energy sector, explains Schalk Cloete in this data-led review. Their cost declines will be confronted and even cancelled by new costs they’ve not yet faced during their low-hanging-fruit … [Read more...]