Reuters 4 Dec 07;
"I think more pilot projects have to be done, more analytical work has to be done really to convince the skeptics that this is a technology that can be safely applied."
NUSA DUA, Indonesia (Reuters) - Current talks in Bali on climate change will not decide to include support for the burying of greenhouse gases as part of a successor deal to the Kyoto Protocol, the U.N.'s top climate official said.
But the talks may put the so-far unproven technology, carbon capture and storage, on the agenda for future backing, Yvo de Boer told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday.
About 190 countries are meeting in Bali, Indonesia, aiming to launch two years of talks to agree a new global climate change pact to succeed the Kyoto Protocol after 2012.
"I think there's still quite a lot of concern out there about carbon capture and storage," said de Boer.
"I think more pilot projects have to be done, more analytical work has to be done really to convince the skeptics that this is a technology that can be safely applied."
"It (the Bali talks) might put CCS on the agenda as one technology to be considered as part of a mitigation solution."
Carbon capture technology is widely believed to be a crucial weapon without which emissions of the commonest man-made greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide (CO2), may pass dangerous limits.
The technology is supposed to trap emissions from coal-fired power plants, which are proliferating globally, and pump the gas underground. But there is no such commercial-scale power plant project yet anywhere.
That is because of the extra expense to install CCS technology, estimated at some $1 billion per plant.
One idea is that, under a new global climate deal, rich countries could meet their emissions limits by funding carbon capture projects in developing nations, earning carbon offsets in return.
Because no new commercial-scale CCS projects are expected to be operational for several years, the technology is only relevant to a Kyoto successor deal.
(Reporting by Gerard Wynn and Alister Doyle, Editing by Anthony Barker)
Carbon capture not on table at UN climate talks: UN official
Yahoo News 6 Dec 07;
An embryonic but much-hailed technology to bury polluting carbon dioxide is unlikely to form part of early negotiations for a new global warming pact, a top UN official said Wednesday.
Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said delegates on Indonesia's Bali had discussed carbon capture and storage with enthusiasm.
But he said more research was needed on the still-experimental technology, which some experts say would cut about 35 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions from steel mills, cement plants and power plants.
"I do not expect a decision at this conference on the inclusion of carbon capture and storage," he told reporters on the third day of the conference.
"I think further analytical work has to be done."
The technology would capture carbon dioxide released by power plants or other factories, transport it and bury it underground -- either in old oil fields or coal mines, or even at the bottom of the ocean.
The theory goes that once the gas is buried, it would no longer contribute to global warming, and environmental groups have called for more investment and research into carbon capture and storage.
Europe and the United States are already experimenting with the technology, but it is still in the development stage and requires massive investment to make it commercially viable.
OPEC leaders said last month that they were planning to make carbon capture and storage the centrepiece of their newfound green agenda by urging greater use of the emerging technique to curb carbon emissions.
Nearly 190 countries have gathered at the UNFCCC meeting in Bali, which aims to see them agree to negotiate a new regime to combat climate change when the current phase of the Kyoto Protocol ends in 2012.
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