– A necessary stamp for credibility

From my point of view, passing at TCM is required for the vendor for de-risking the scale up but it is also the “necessary” stamp for having credibility in the market.

The words belong to Stephane Jouenne, who is R&D CO₂ Capture project coordinator at TotalEnergies. The company is one of three industrial owners of Technology Centre Mongstad (TCM), together with Shell and Equinor. In 2021 Jouenne joined TCM’s Technical Committee (TC) and became its leader.

Stephane Jouenne is educated as an Engineer in Chemical Engineering at ENSIC in Nancy, France. Doctor of Philosophy – PhD, Material Science from ESPCI Paris – PSL in 2005 and has been working for TotalEnergies since then.

– How important is the work in the committee to your own work as R&D CO₂ Capture project coordinator at TotalEnergies?

– My activities in TotalEnergies and TC are fully complementary and interlinked. Being at the R&D, I need to keep an eye on all the CO₂ capture technologies. The amine plant at TCM is the “test centre” of mature solvent technologies whereas 3^rd site is the crossing point of emerging and promising technologies. There is nothing better to understand a technology than following its pilot implementation. You can really touch the performances, the operability, the benefits and the remaining gaps before implementation.

– What would be the optimal next big campaign at TCM based on non-proprietary technology – what knowledge gap does the public CCS community need closed?

– TCM has already brought a lot in the development of CESAR 1 non-proprietary solvent through ALIGN CCUS project and two owner’s campaigns. A lot of learnings were acquired on emissions, solvent degradation, operational issues such as foaming, performances in steady state and dispatchable operations (cf the recently published IEAGHG report on the effect of plant Startup ans shutdown, see https://ieaghg.org/ccs-resources/blog/new-ieaghg-report-2022-08-start-up-and-shutdown-protocol-for-power-stations-with-co2-capture).

– In addition, tests performed at TCM are ideal because of the size of the amine unit for developing and validating models for simulations. TCM has recently enlarged the CO₂ concentration range of the flue gas, that can now be operated between 4 (or even lower) and 20 % CO₂ content. A new test campaign investigating this wide range of CO₂ concentration, showing the benefit of the recently installed intercooler, with additional emission measurements would complete the development of this open-source solvent. Since solvent management can reveal OPEX intensive, investigating reclaiming technologies other than thermal reclaiming would be a plus.

– What is your assessment of TCM’s importance for the Norwegian investment in CCS through the Longship project?

­– For the implementation of CCS, CO₂ capture needs to be developed in parallel to transport and storage, it is the enabler. TCM fulfilled these objectives. By demonstrating robustness and reliability, TCM gave the confidence to the market that several technologies are matured and ready to be deployed. In addition, TCM developed a whole spectrum of expertise which are today fully at the service of the different capture projects of Longship. TCM is accompanying industrials during the preparation phase and is undeniably willing to support them when projects will be in operation.

– Do you think the Norwegian industry, supported by the authorities, could have realized this full-scale capture and storage project if TCM had not existed?

– Deploying a technology requires a multistage approach from the lab to the commercial deployment to resolve key uncertainties and de-risk the projects. With the amine plant, TCM offers the highest scale pilot facility in Europe and even in the world to test a solvent before its large-scale implementation.  If TCM had not existed, CO₂ emitting industries would have been more reluctant to build a CO₂ capture plant. Authorities would have to support and pay for this lack of confidence and the “learning by doing” of the end-users.

– What is your assessment of TCM’s role in the future?

– The CCS market should now grow rapidly. I expect that TCM will continue to share its expertise, offer its services and develop new competencies from the operational feedback of the CO₂ capture plants in operation. 

– Do you think the amine plant will be relevant for further improvements to this capture technology, especially to reduce costs by use of the technology at full scale plants?

– The two pillars for reducing the technical cost are solvent and process development. One seeks to maximize performances in term of capture and energy, minimize the cost of both the solvent and the process, the solvent losses, the emissions, the footprint and limit operational issues. Changing the whole process of the amine unit is not conceivable. However, there is still a room for improvement in evaluating the effect of some process modifications like for example intercooling.  Once built, commercial CO₂ capture units will have to deal with solvent management issues which can be OPEX intensive. Testing innovative flue gas pre-treatment technologies and alternative reclaiming technologies on the unit could bring a lot of value. At last, long-term testing of solvents would enable to investigate solvent degradation and emissions in more representative conditions.

– A last work: research does not stop when a technology is becoming mature. Operational issues arise new challenges and problematics. Tackling these problematics is a fertile ground for the innovations to come. 

– What opportunities do you see for TCM when it comes to testing of new technologies?

– The two first campaigns with MTR and TDA Research were performed on the 3^rd site. Although successful, TCM will in the time to come develop a specific knowhow and experience for operating these new technologies. In addition, TCM will transpose its excellence related to emissions measurement, operations in safe HSE context, process modification and technical assistance.

– Should TCM expand the range of offers for technology development within CCS? How?

– 3^rd site is already suitable for testing Direct Air Capture technologies (DAC). Adding a biomass boiler would enable to investigate BECCS.

– At last, even if it might not be the key focus in Norwegian strategy, we can think about adding the U in CCS to deal with CCUS. Having a site for testing CO₂ conversion technologies (which would require a CO₂ storage on the site) or even units combining both capture and CO₂ utilization should be pertinent in the coming years.

– 3^rd site is indeed a site suitable for testing a wide variety of technologies. As a general rule, whatever the technology, it is much easier to test a pilot unit on a dedicated site such as the 3^rd site with operators and operations focusing on the results and the success of the campaign. In comparison, when the pilot campaign is performed on the end user site, there is a risk of interference and a lack of support due to the prioritization of daily operations of the site.