Norway abandons full-scale CCS project

The Norwegian government is abandoning its project to build a full-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) facility at an oil refinery and gas-fired power plant in Mongstad.

Norway still aims to have a full-scale CCS facility in operation somewhere in the country by 2020, but ‘the risk connected to the Mongstad facility is too high,’ according to a statement from Ola Borten Moe, the minister for petroleum and energy.

The government is committing NOK400 million (£41 million) over four years to the CCS technology development centre in Mongstad. However, the move essentially takes the most advanced CCS programme in Europe back to the drawing board in terms of looking for new projects to back.

Political instability in support for CCS, coupled with badly-administered funding programmes, have dogged projects across Europe, leaving actual progress well behind the targets set for reducing emissions.