Washington — Natural gas and coal plants in Texas, California and North Dakota will share up to $890 million in U.S. funding for projects to demonstrate the viability of carbon capture technologies, the U.S. Energy Department said on Thursday.Carbon capture and storage, or CCS, is an emerging technology that the administration of President Joe Biden says is vital to help fight climate change. CCS plants aim to pull carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel plants before they reach the atmosphere for storage underground.
Project Tundra, in Center, North Dakota, which is adjacent to the Milton Young lignite coal plant got $350 million. Senator Kevin Cramer, a Republican, said in a release it will be a “major feather in the cap for North Dakota’s innovative energy system, keeping miners on the job while putting clean, reliable electricity on the grid.”
Other projects getting the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law funding include a CCS system at the Baytown Energy Center natural gas plant in Texas, and one at the Sutter Energy Center gas plant in Yurba City, California.
CBO said the extent to which CCS will be used in the future is “highly uncertain” depending on changes in the costs and availability of pipeline networks to transport CO2.
Reporting by Timothy Gardner; Editing by David Gregorio – Reuters
