Behind the official acronym CCUS – capture, storage and valorization of carbon dioxide – lies one of the solutions regularly put forward by experts to decarbonize the industrial sector and enable France to achieve its objective of carbon neutrality on the horizon. 2050. But it is also the risk, often raised by environmental defenders, of allowing industrialists to be able, ultimately, to continue to pollute.
The Minister for Industry and Energy, Roland Lescure, launched a call for expressions of interest on Friday April 26 so that companies can propose CO₂ landfill projects in France. The announcement was made in Sens (Yonne), from the Technip Energies factory.
The government is addressing in particular the operators of hydrocarbon deposits present in the territory, in order to reconvert their oil wells at the end of exploitation or exhausted into carbon storage wells. The law on simplification, presented Wednesday to the Council of Ministers, plans to modify mining law to facilitate this type of reconversion. The Canadian group Vermilion notably operates wells in Nouvelle-Aquitaine and Seine-et-Marne, and former oil and gas deposits also exist in the Pyrenees.
Stored, but not disposed of
Carbon capture and storage involves trapping CO₂ produced in factories, liquefying it for transport, then burying it underground or at sea. But these technologies are new and still unstable. They are also criticized because carbon is stored, but not eliminated.
Among the fifty industrial sites emitting the most CO₂ in France, two thirds believe they must capture and store their residual carbon (that remaining at the end of the chain, which could not be eliminated by other technical means) if they want to be able to respect their decarbonization contract signed with the government in 2022. These heavy industries (cement plants, steelworks, aluminum smelters, etc.) have estimated their capture needs at around 8 million tonnes of CO₂ in 2030 and 16 million in 2040.
The Ministry of Industry and Energy has calculated that the conversion of hydrocarbon wells into carbon wells would offer storage potential of “800 million tonnes of CO₂ », or the equivalent of “fifty years of CO storage₂ of French industry ».
An imperative that is both strategic and economic
But, questioned by The echoes Friday April 26, Roland Lescure recalled that the decarbonization plan for the fifty most emitting sites first provides for measures such as “energy efficiency, electrification, replacement of coal with hydrogen”. “Capture only happens as a last resort”he clarified.
You have 24.79% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.