Background

The IEA Greenhouse Gas R&D Programme (IEA GHG) undertakes studies to assess technologies for abatement of greenhouse gas emissions. IEA GHG has concentrated on CO2 Capture and Storage (CCS) applied to power generation but it has also assessed CCS in other industries and will compare the relative merits of CCS and alternative greenhouse gas abatement options. Soon after IEA GHG started operation in 1991 it produced a set of standard technical and economic criteria for assessment of power plants with capture to ensure that its studies are undertaken on a consistent basis, as far as possible. These criteria have continued to be used since then, with some minor modifications.

In the time since IEAGHG was set up, economic conditions have changed, knowledge of CCS and other technologies has increased and IEA GHG has been undertaking increasingly detailed studies. In response to these changes IEA GHG has decided to revise and expand its assessment criteria. As a starting point IEA GHG’s criteria for new power plants with CO2 capture have been updated and some general guidelines for assessment of other types of plant with CO2 capture have been included. These changes are described in this report. Future work will look to expand the criteria to encompass retrofit of CO2 capture, the full CCS chain including CO2 transport and storage and non-CCS energy technologies. In the mean time a notional cost of CO2 transport and storage shall be assumed and sensitivities to a range of costs shall be assessed.

IEAGHG’s original power plant assessment criteria relate to a standard location in the Netherlands. This will continue to be IEA GHG’s standard power plant location but criteria have been developed for a range of alternative locations to enable study contractors to produce sensitivity cases for alternative locations if required, to enable IEA GHG’s members to apply study results to different local conditions.

Conclusions and Recommendations

IEA GHG has produced a revised set of criteria for assessment of plants, particularly power plants with CO2 capture, making use of information from EPRI and others.

The revised criteria should be used by IEA GHG for its future studies. Other organisations are encouraged to use the criteria to provide consistency of results.

Preliminary criteria have been specified for alternative locations and these should be finalised with local organisations at the time when IEA GHG undertakes its first study for each alternative location. Other alternative locations could be considered in future, at the request of IEA GHG’s members.

As a follow on to this report IEA GHG will assess the feasibility of providing standard assessment criteria for CO2 transport and storage and it will develop methodologies for comparing the relative merits of CCS and alternative low-CO2 technologies.