Alberta CCS fund

Brief description:

In early 2009, the government of Alberta passed legislation that cleared the way for allocating $2 billion of provincial funding towards CCS projects. Successful projects are eligible to receive up to a maximum of 75% of the total cost of capturing, transporting and storing CO2.  A maximum of up to 40% of funding will be distributed during the design and construction stage and up to a further 20% of funding will be granted upon commercial operation. The remaining 40% of funding will be paid as CO2 is captured and stored over a maximum period of 10 years.

The first round of commercial scale projects is expected to achieve annual carbon dioxide reductions by 2015 equivalent to taking approximately one-million vehicles, or about a third of all registered vehicles in the province, off of the road. 

• The fourth and final project to sign a letter of intent for funding is with Swan Hills Synfuels. The province will invest $285 million in this in-situ coal gasification (ISCG) project which will access deep coal seams. These seams, which are about 1,400 metres below surface, have traditionally been considered too deep to mine. Wells will access the seams and be used to convert the coal underground into a clean synthetic gas known as syngas. The syngas will be used to fuel new high-efficiency power generation and the CO2 created during this process will be captured and used for enhanced oil recovery (EOR).
• $495 million will go to Enhance Energy Inc. and North West Upgrading for the Alberta Carbon Trunk Line (ACTL), a 240 kilometre pipeline that will transport CO2. The initial supplies of CO2 will come from the Agrium Redwater Complex and once built, the North West Upgrader. North West Upgrading will upgrade bitumen from Alberta’s oil sands and the captured CO2 will be transported to depleting conventional oilfields and used in enhanced oil recovery (EOR).
•  $745 million will go to Shell and its partners for the Shell Quest project. Quest will capture and store 1.2 million tonnes of carbon dioxide annually beginning in 2015 from Shell’s Scotford upgrader and expansion, near Fort Saskatchewan.
•  $436 million to TransAlta Corporation and its partners for Project Pioneer at the Keephills 3 plant west of Edmonton. The project will utilize leading-edge technology to capture CO2 which will be used for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) in nearby conventional oil fields, or stored almost three kilometres underground. The project is expected to capture one million tonnes of carbon dioxide annually beginning in 2015. The Government of Alberta’s investment in this project is