Annual Report 2010 - Enel.com

Zero-emission thermal
power generation - CO 2
capture and storage (CCS)
In the coming decades, traditional energy sources (such
as coal and natural gas) will continue to play a key role
in satisfying the growing global demand for electricity. As
such, it is necessary for these power generation technologies
to become increasingly compatible with environmental
needs. The best technologies currently available are
already able to reduce the emission of pollutants (sulfur
dioxide, nitrogen oxides, particulates) to well within legal
limits. However, with regard to the reduction of carbon
dioxide emissions, which is not a pollutant per se but contributes
to increasing the concentrations of greenhouse
gases in the atmosphere, further efforts are still necessary.
Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is the key technology
for enabling emissions of CO to be reduced during
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the generation of electricity from fossil fuels such as coal,
which is necessary to ensure a balanced diversification
of the mix of energy sources. However, CCS technology
has not yet reached commercial maturity. Thus, research
efforts must be focused on demonstrating the feasibility
on an industrial scale of currently available technologies
(such as post-combustion, coal gasification or combustion
in oxygen) and on improving their performance (such as in
terms of their impact on energy yields).
Enel is among those cutting-edge companies studying
and demonstrating CCS technologies, focusing on capturing
coal plants’ CO emissions (post-combustion capture),
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on innovative oxygenated coal combustion technologies,
and technologies for the gasification of fossil fuels (precombustion
capture) and on CO storage solutions.
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Post-combustion CO 2 capture
and storage
The Enel Group is engaged in various projects in the field
of post-combustion and geological storage, the broadest
reaching of which includes a pilot capture system in Brindisi
and, subsequently, a demonstration system for carbon
capture, transport and storage in Porto Tolle (Rovigo). At
the end of 2009, Enel obtained €100 million in funding
for these projects under the European Energy Plan for
Recovery, and the company has submitted pre-candidacy
documents to the Italian Government in order to receive
additional funding under the EU’s NER 300 initiative (2) . In
2010, construction was completed on the pilot integrated
carbon-capture system installed at the Federico II plant in
Brindisi. The commissioning process has also been carried
out, and capture using amines has begun. This pilot system,
one of the first of its scale in either Europe or the rest
of the world, will enable the treatment of 10,000 Nm3 /h
of emissions to separate between 8,000 metric tons per
year of CO and will permit optimization of the capture
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process, thereby augmenting Enel’s know-how in preparation
for the construction of the industrial-scale demonstration
plant (about 250 MWe equivalent) at Porto Tolle.
At the Compostilla plant in Spain, a 300 kWt pilot system
for post-combustion capture with amines has been started
up, and activities are progressing in synergy with the
Brindisi plant.
At the La Pereda plant in Mieres, Asturias, work is under
way to develop and construct a plant to test 1.5 MWt calcium
carbonate looping technology, which is expected to
begin operating in the 1st Half of 2011.
As concerns storage, the characterization and preliminary
selection of areas suitable for construction of the site for
the permanent geological storage of the CO captured at
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the Porto Tolle demonstration plant was completed.
Enel is also active in the biological capture of CO using
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algae and the furtherance of the bio-refinery concept. In
that regard, a 500 m2 pilot photobioreactor has been built
at the Litoral de Almería (Andalusia) coal-fueled plant.
The company is also testing biological CO capture solu-
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tions involving microalgae cultivation on a pilot scale at its
Brindisi laboratory.
Oxygenated combustion
CCS with oxygenated combustion at one atmosphere
is primarily being developed by Endesa with way of the
Compostilla demonstration project, which is being executed
in collaboration with Fundación Ciudad de la Energía
(CIUDEN) and Foster Wheeler. This project has also
received funding, in the amount of €180 million, under
the EU’s European Energy Plan for Recovery.
Construction of the 30 MWt pilot system, which is
(2) The NER 300 initiative, as established by Directive 2003/87/EC, allocates 300 million CO 2 allowances taken from the New Entrants Reserve for the period of 2013-
2020 in order to finance projects in the field of CO 2 capture and storage and innovative technologies in the field of renewable energy. Such projects are to be
selected by way of a call for proposals from among the projects identified by the European Union Member States.
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