CATO 2 | CO2 Capture, Transport and Storage in The Netherlands

SP2 CO2 Transport and Chain integration

Main objectives

The key objective of this SP is to facilitate the implementation of CCS by providing strategic information for dedicated policy making at national and local level.

This SP should result in a quantified blueprint for the deployment of CCS, its impacts, required infrastructure and implementation strategies for the Netherlands and in the larger European and global setting. The main elements of the SP are:

Technical aspects of CO₂ transport infrastructure
Techno-economic chain analysis and cost-benefit assessments
National and international policy analysis
Chain integration and development of a CCS implementation plan.

Background

Creating optimal conditions for CCS is not a simple task. It involves much more than selecting and prioritising problem areas to be explored and technologies to be developed in – for instance – pilot and demonstration projects.

It will involve considerations of how to best implement CCS strategies at the local and (inter)national level, which institutions to involve, which funding sources to exploit, and which incentive structures to use to mobilise resources effectively.

Another important issue is deciding where the Netherlands might lead CCS development, where it could follow the development of CCS technologies and how these efforts could be coordinated with other national and international programmes, particularly those in Europe.

Furthermore, the overall (macro) economic costs of developing and building large scale CCS infrastructure compared to alternative pathways for lowering GHG emissions of the Dutch energy system is a key (strategic) issue that requires detailed understanding.

Dealing with these issues requires both ‘hard’ scientific and technological R&D, aimed at technical solutions and ‘soft’ socio-economic research designed to help us understanding how to implement the needed responses. It also requires communication between the actors involved at different stages of the CCS chain (capture, transport, storage, monitoring and verification) and coordination and orchestration of activities if unnecessary duplication is to be avoided and synergy exploited.