Nov. 30 (Bloomberg) — U.K. plans to build carbon-capture
and storage plants missed out on financing from the first phase
of a 1.5 billion-euro ($2 billion) European Commission program
after failing to secure funding guarantees from the government.
“We didn’t get into the first round of NER300 funding,”
U.K. Energy Secretary Ed Davey told lawmakers yesterday after
presenting a bill to overhaul the power market to Parliament.
The projects will still be able to access a second round.
Carbon-capture developers in the U.K., which pitched the
Teesside and White Rose ventures in northern England for funds,
had sought more time from the commission to obtain government
guarantees to ensure eligibility. At stake was about 600 million
euros in first-phase cash, according to the European Parliament.
Britain missed out because it failed to provide adequate
commitments for its proposals, Chris Davies, a member of the EU
Parliament’s Environment Committee, said today by telephone.
“It’s a kick in the teeth for many, many British companies
working on plans to develop CCS,” he said.
Davies blamed divisions in the coalition government for the
failure to guarantee projects.
While the European Commission has made no formal
announcement, discussions indicate Britain is unlikely to
receive CCS funding in the first round, the U.K. Department of
Energy and Climate Change said by e-mail, without giving a
reason. Britain remains committed to CCS, it said.
Carbon-capture technology, which works by siphoning off
polluting emissions from power stations and factories for
permanent burial underground, is yet to operate on a commercial
scale at electricity plants.
France’s Alstom SA and Britain’s Drax Group Plc, partners
in the White Rose venture, asked the commission this month to
defer the first round for a “few months” as they negotiated
with national governments.
Davies said today the funds available in the second phase
would be “tiny” by comparison.
To contact the reporter responsible for this story:
Sally Bakewell in London at
Sbakewell1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Reed Landberg at
landberg@bloomberg.net
