Erin, the Energy Systems Integration Group, at the University of Galway conducts research on modelling and optimising sustainable and renewable energy value chains, including green hydrogen and renewable fuels, carbon capture, utilisation and storage, and bioenergy, for decabonising hard-to-abate sectors.

News

This week we wrap up a Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) project between University of Galway and University of Liverpool on CCUS. The final report is available here. Here are some highlights. 

1. CCUS has a small but important role in fully decarbonising Ireland’s future energy system, focused in industries that are extremely difficult to decarbonise by ANY other means, like cement, but also for backup power generation when renewables are not available (energy storage has a major role here too).

2. The cost of CCUS in Ireland will be higher than elsewhere because future gas power plants will have low full-load hours since they will operate more like backup to renewables & our emission sources are small and dispersed.

3. We know very little about the CO2 storage capacity of potential offshore reservoirs in Ireland. This needs to be addressed ASAP since exporting CO2 for storage elsewhere adds significant cost.

4. There are encouraging early indicators on how Ireland’s geology is suited to mineral carbonation, a novel way of storing CO2 as “new rock” rather than pressurised fluid. Basalt in Northern Ireland looks especially interesting, but more characterisation work is needed.

5. At present, it is hard to see where in Ireland CO2 can be utilised at scale, that is, transformed into some other material that would avoid its release into the atmosphere for a very long time. Concrete curing is interesting but required volumes are small compared to what we release. Combining fossil CO2 and hydrogen to make SAF is currently allowed under EU RFNBO rules, but this is only a medium-term measure to prime the power-to-X sector.

6. CCUS costs and emissions can be minimised by careful design of CO2 supply chains that link emitters of different size and location through hubs and onward to storage or export terminals.

7. The best time for Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment to start thinking seriously about CCUS was 20 years ago. The next best time is now. Make no mistake, CCUS is difficult and expensive and most existing CO2 emitters can, should and will be decarbonised by some other method like electrification, bioenergy or hydrogen, but until we stop needing cement or metals, CCUS looks like it has a role.

Thanks to our excellent collaborators David McNamara, Tiernan Henry & superb researchers Haresh Jayashankar, Jonathan Alexander and John Conneally. We are grateful to SEAI for funding us, to John Conroy, Paul Monaghan, Gearóid FitzGerald for their input, and to the Ryan Institute and MaREI for research support.