Carbon Capture Tipped to Be Major Source of Breakbulk Work in Coming Years
By Simon West
Shell Catalysts & Technologies, Technip Energies and Zachry Group have won a front-end engineering and design, or FEED, contract for a carbon capture project, or CCP, at US power producer Calpine’s Baytown Energy Center in Texas.
The project will be designed to capture some two million tonnes per year of CO2, which represents 95 percent of carbon emissions from processed flue gas released at BTEC, a natural gas combined cycle power plant, or CCGT.
Shell Catalysts & Technologies and Technip have been partners in an alliance for more than decade to market and execute projects using Shell’s Cansolv carbon capture technology. The two companies are already working on a CCP at Calpine’s Deer Park facility, also in Texas.
Zachary’s scope will comprise outside battery limits engineering, site preparation and construction planning. The Texas-based engineer will also develop the project’s cost estimate and schedule.
Nick Flinn, vice president of decarbonisation technologies at Shell Catalysts & Technologies, said the company was “delighted” to have been awarded the contract.
“By working closely with Technip Energies, which is performing the engineering and procurement of the Cansolv plant, and Zachary Group, which is performing the balance of plant engineering, procurement and construction for the project, we will deliver a complete end-to-end solution for Calpine that could serve as a blueprint in the industry.”
Carbon capture and storage, or CCS, is tipped to be a major source of cargo-carrying opportunities for breakbulk and project cargo in the coming years. The technique is deployed in power plants and other industrial facilities to trap and compress CO2 before transporting it to special sites for underground storage.
The technique is seen as a critical tool to help decarbonize the energy sector, with large-scale CSS plants demanding breakbulk support to transport and install pipelines, storage tanks, giant compressors, processing equipment, ship-handling facilities and other oversized components.
Calpine, the largest generator of electricity from natural gas and geothermal resources in the US, operates the BTEC as a natural gas-fired power plant that incorporates combined-cycle and cogeneration technologies.
The plant consists of three combustion turbines with three heat recovery steam generators and has been recognized as a “showcase plant” by the US Energy Department.
“Our Baytown project is an important part of our far-reaching efforts to showcase the full potential of CCS as a critical emissions-reduction technology and we are eager to continue with its development,” said Caleb Stephenson, executive vice president of commercial operations at Calpine.
Shell, Technip and Zachry Group are members of the Breakbulk Global Shipper Network, a worldwide group of shippers involved in the engineering, manufacturing and production of project cargo.
Photo Credit: Shell
