Carbon capture contract

has been contracted by

to construct a demonstration chilled ammonia (carbonate) CO

capture plant in Norway.

The demonstration plant will be the first one of its kind to treat flue gas from a gas-fired power plant.

StatoilHydro, the operator of the project, signed the contract on behalf of TCM, a partnership of three companies with a strategic interest in developing new post-combustion CO₂ capture technology. The other partners include Gassnova and A/S Norske Shell.

Alstom will supply and install the demonstration plant, due to be operational in November 2011, which will use the company's chilled ammonia post-combustion technology to capture CO₂ from the flue gases of a combined heat and power plant at Mongstad. It will also treat flue gases from a petroleum-processing plant at the nearby Mongstad refinery, which has a CO₂ output equal to that of a coal-fired power plant.

It is claimed the TCM facility at Mongstad is the largest planned demonstration facility of its kind with an annual capacity to capture up to 100,000 metric tonnes of CO₂.

The Alstom-developed chilled ammonia technology will have the capacity to capture 80,000 metric tonnes per year, the equivalent of 40 MWt, which is said to be equivalent to the annual CO₂ emissions of approximately 33,000 cars.

Philippe Joubert, president of Alstom Power, said ‘This project, masterminded by our R&D and engineering experts, represents an important milestone for Alstom's chilled ammonia capture technology on the road to full commercialisation by 2015.'

Tore Amundsen, the managing director of TCM, said: ‘The main goal of testing chilled ammonia is to qualify the technology for the large-scale treatment of flue gases, while at the same time developing a cost- and energy-efficient solution. That is why the contract signed with Alstom today is an important step forward for TCM.’

Alstom believes the CO₂ demonstration project is particularly significant given the importance of Norway's role as a gas exporter. Norway is the second largest exporter of gas to the European Union after Russia, supplying more than 15 per cent of the European gas market.

In recent months, Alstom has announced agreements with AEP, the Dow Chemical Company, E.ON, PGE Elektrownia, StatoilHydro, Total, TransAlta, Vattenfall and We Energies to test CO₂ capture technologies in Europe and North America.

Alstom has already started operations at several CO₂ capture pilot projects, including projects with We Energies in the US, E.ON in Sweden and Vattenfall in Germany.