(2011-5-25) Toshiba Corp. has announced that it will discuss potential development of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies with Chinese electricity generator, China Huadian Corp. The two companies have already reportedly signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on CCS co-operation with a view to reducing carbon-dioxide emissions from thermal power plants. The companies expect to deploy the technology by 2015, with the expectation that CCS technology will become a widely adopted means of reducing carbon-dioxide emissions by 2020.

Toshiba Corp. started its research and development into CCS back in 2006, and in 2009 completed construction of its first pilot CCS plant, which is designed to capture a modest 10 tons of carbon dioxide per day from a flue gas boiler at the Mikawa power plant in Fukuoka prefecture, Japan. The project was aimed at verifying performance of the technology to aid CCS designs for larger scale power plants with a longer term view to establishing commercial scale systems by 2015 and capturing net sales of JPY100 billion (USD1.22 billion) from CCS-related sales by 2020. Co-operation with China Huadian Corp. could potentially speed up technological development in the sector--as the company has been working on its own CCS designs--and potentially paves the way for Toshiba to deploy its matured technology in the giant thermal power plant sector in China, where the government is keen to drive down carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP. The MoU with China Huadian follows a similar agreement reportedly signed with Indian state electricity company NTPC in February 2011--another market where giant planned increases in coal-fired capacity promise opportunities for CCS technologies. However, making CCS an attractive proposition in China and India will mean bringing down the capital costs of installing facilities at power plants and developing CCS technology so it can capture a larger proportion of thermal power plant emissions, and be deployed at large-scale facilities.

Source:Tom Grieder, Global Insight