The Danish and Belgian governments have entered into an agreement to enable captured carbon to be shipped across their borders, to be permanently stored in a sandstone reservoir 1,800m beneath the seabed of the Danish North Sea. The agreement allows Project Greensand (work to reduce carbon emissions by capturing them and storing them in the subsoil of the North Sea) to move forwards with Europe’s first-ever trial of the entire supply chain for carbon capture and storage to be carried out later this year.
Carbon dioxide, that is captured by INEOS, a global chemical company, at its plant at the Zwijndrecht site will be shipped via the port of Antwerp to INEOS’ Nini West site, 200km off the coast of Denmark. Once there, it will be injected as a liquid into a former oil field below the seabed surface.
Project Greensand will bring together a consortium of 23 specialised companies, research centres, institutions and logistic partners led by INEOS and Wintershall Dea. The ambition of the project is to eventually store up to 8 million tonnes of CO2 per year by 2030.
Vincent Van Quickenborne, Belgian Federal Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for the North Sea says: ‘The development of new methods to reduce carbon emissions is vital for the future of our planet. The sea can play a key role in this. Not only has it always been very important for regulating our climate, but it also offers opportunities for carbon capture, recycling and storage. The Greensand project is one of the leading CO2 storage projects in Europe. We have signed an agreement with Denmark to cooperate on this so that we can store our captured CO2 in their empty oil and gas fields.’