CCS interest

Alstom, the global power and transport services provider, has become a founding member of the Global Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) Institute in Australia.

The institute aims to develop ways of collaborating between government and businesses to commercialise CCS technology and reduce CO2 emissions. The initiative intends to accelerate carbon projects through a variety of measures including demonstration technologies and the promotion of research.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), CCS could provide a quarter of the global CO2 emission reduction needed by 2050. The analysis by IEA claims that without using CCS, reducing the volume of CO2 emissions to the same extent could cost an additional $1,300bn (£844bn) per year.

Joan MacNaughton, senior vice president of Power and Environmental Policies at Alstom Power Systems, said: ‘Our interest in CCS technology and its commercialisation is a long-standing one. Alstom is a worldwide leader in technologies for reducing CO2 from power generation and in air quality control systems for power stations. We have developed three technologies for carbon capture: advanced amine scrubbing, chilled ammonia process and oxy-firing.