Harbour Energy, the largest London-listed independent oil and gas company, and bp agreed to develop a carbon capture and storage (CCS) transportation and storage project, a statement from Harbour Energy revealed on Tuesday.
Harbour Energy will be the operator of the Viking CCS with a 60% interest, while bp will acquire a 40% non-operated share.
The project, which will be located close to the heavily industrialized Humber region, will have the potential to meet one-third of the UK's target to capture and store up to 30 million tons of CO2 annually by 2030.
'The delivery of the Viking project could be transformational for the region, potentially unlocking up to £7 billion of investment across the full CO2 capture, transport, and storage value chain over the next decade, creating over 10,000 jobs during construction, and providing an estimated £4 billion of gross value add to the Humber and its surrounding areas,' the statement read.
The agreement was announced in response to the UK government's recent decision to launch Track 2 of its CCS cluster sequencing process, as well as its recognition of Viking CCS as one of two leading transport and storage system contenders for this process.
Harbour and bp already share an interest in the Lincolnshire Offshore Gas Gathering System (LOGGS) pipeline, which will be repurposed as part of the project. The pipeline provides a unique, low-cost opportunity to connect customers to the depleted Viking gas fields, which recently had 300 million tons of CO2 storage capacity independently verified.
A final investment decision for the project is expected in 2024 and it could be operational as early as 2027, potentially storing up to 10 million tons of CO2 per year by 2030, according to the statement.
'We welcome the UK government's recent announcement about the launch of Track 2 and the addition of bp as a partner to this transformational project. Viking CCS has the potential to unlock billions of pounds of investment across the full CCS value chain and is crucial for the UK to meet its emissions reduction targets,' Linda Z Cook, CEO of Harbour Energy, was quoted as saying in the statement.
Anja Dotzenrath, executive vice president of Gas and Low Carbon Energy at bp said that Viking CCS is a project that could play an instrumental role in helping to decarbonize the UK and provide CO2 transport and storage as a service to emitters across industry sectors and geographies.
By Nuran Erkul in London
Anadolu Agency
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