Despite the decision in Alberta to step away from a carbon capture and storage project, officials in Saskatchewan say they remain committed to the $1.2-billion project at SaskPower’s Boundary Dam power station near Estevan, which has received $240-million in funding from the federal government.
SaskPower is aiming to demonstrate that carbon dioxide from a coal-fired generating station can be captured post-combustion and safely stored or used for enhanced oil recovery projects in the oilpatch.
Rob Norris, the government minister responsible for SaskPower, said the technology being used for the Saskatchewan project is different than what was being pursued in the now-stalled Alberta project, which involved using chilled ammonia to strip carbon dioxide out of emissions from TransAlta Corp.’s new Keephills 3 coal-fired generation station. TransAlta estimated the technology would eliminate one million tonnes of greenhouse gas a year.
The gas then would have been used to enhance oil production by injecting it into mature wells, as well as stored in deep saline aquifers.
