Oil majors ExxonMobil Corporation, Shell plc (Shell), CNOOC Ltd, and Guangdong Provincial Development & Reform Commission have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to evaluate the potential for a world-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) project to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at the Dayawan Petrochemical Industrial Park in Huizhou, Guangdong Province, China.
In addition to assessing the commercial opportunity for carbon capture and storage in one of China’s largest industrial areas, the companies will also evaluate the carbon policy systems in China and propose policies for consideration that would support the deployment of carbon capture and storage (CCS) in Dayawan Petrochemical Industrial Park.
Initial assessments of the project indicate the potential to capture up to 10 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) per year from Dayawan Petrochemical Industrial Park, supporting China’s ambition of carbon neutrality by 2060.
The project could also serve as a model for the chemical industry as one of the first petrochemical projects to be decarbonized.
Collaboration with government and industry is an important part of unlocking future carbon capture and storage opportunities, with the potential for large-scale reductions of emissions from vital sectors of the global economy, said Dan Ammann, President of ExxonMobil Low Carbon Solutions.
According to ExxonMobil, while renewable technologies are important to help reach society’s net-zero objectives, carbon capture and storage is a “safe, proven and consistent technology” that can enable some of the highest-emitting sectors such as manufacturing, power generation, refining, petrochemical, steel, and cement industries to reduce their emissions.
Well-designed government policies will help accelerate the broad deployment of lower-emissions technologies in support of society’s net-zero ambitions, Dan Ammann said.
The prospect of bringing together public and private entities to utilize carbon capture and storage collectively to reduce industrial emissions offers tremendous opportunity.
ExxonMobil is also pursuing strategic investments in biofuels and hydrogen to bring those lower-emissions energy technologies to scale for hard-to-decarbonize sectors of the global economy, by leveraging the skills, knowledge, and scale of the business.
The company has more than 30 years of experience capturing CO2 and has cumulatively captured more human-made CO2 than any other company. It has an equity share of about one-fifth of the world’s carbon capture and storage capacity at about 9 million tonnes per year.
