Saskatchewan carbon capture facility likely to fall short of annual target: CEO
May 13, 2019 | By Stephanie Taylor
REGINA – The CEO of SaskPower says he doesn’t think the province’s carbon capture and storage facility will be able to meet its yearly target for trapping carbon dioxide.
Mike Marsh says the Crown corporation’s coal-fired Boundary Dam power plant in southeastern Saskatchewan has an annual goal of capturing 800,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide.
“Just based on how the year has started, we will probably come in slightly under that.”
Marsh cites a tornado last summer that caused four generating stations to go off line as well as additional equipment failures at the carbon capture site.
He also says the plant had to undergo planned maintenance in March.
The $1.5-billion facility near Estevan opened in 2014 and takes emissions produced by burning fossil fuels and stores them.
SaskPower’s online blog says since operational startup, the project has kept nearly 2.6 million tonnes of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere, which is equal to removing more than 600,000 cars off the road.
However, Marsh says it has achieved its annual target for capturing carbon dioxide only once and that was in 2016.
“We’ve had a number of years where we’ve had successive maintenance issues and other issues that affect not just the carbon capture plant, but the power station,” says Marsh.
“Engineering teams and our operations staff continue to work on the technical issues that don’t allow us to hit that 800,000 tonnes.”
Last year, SaskPower reported the facility captured about 626,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide and about 507,000 tonnes in 2017.
“I think it’s a fair target,” says Marsh of the current figure.
“There’s been an inordinate amount of off-time due to other things like the tornado last summer.”
Any future expansion of carbon capture and storage technology remains up in the air. SaskPower shelved plans to convert two additional units at the Boundary Dam due to cost.
Marsh said in November 2017 that, while the technology itself was still worthwhile, the low cost of natural gas made that a more viable option.
SaskPower is eyeing the possibility of retrofitting the nearby Shand Power Station to give it carbon capture and storage capacity, but Marsh says any decision is years away and will depend on an economic assessment.
