© Supplied by Aquaterra Energy/Asp Offshore solutions provider Aquaterra Energy has secured two contracts to support a major carbon capture and storage (CCS) project in Teesside.
Aquaterra said the “landmark” contracts with the Northern Endurance Partnership (NEP) project came after successful commercial and technical evaluations.
The BP and Equinor-led NEP is the CO2 transportation and storage provider for the East Coast Cluster, a group of industrial emitters in Teesside and the Humber.
The £4 billion project became the first in the UK to receive an offshore storage licence from the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA) regulator last year.
The NEP could achieve first injection of CO2 as early as 2028, and eventually store up to 4 million tonnes of CO2 annually.
Aquaterra Energy chief executive George Morrison said the NEP has the potential to “set a global benchmark” in the CCS industry.
“This is a milestone project for CCS in the UK, and we’re proud to be playing a central role,” he said.
© Supplied by Aquaterra Energy“Our early recognition of the engineering challenges facing the sector has enabled us to be at the forefront of this pioneering initiative, providing the solutions needed for enabling long term, large-scale offshore CO2 storage.”
Speaking to Energy Voice earlier this year, Morrison said CCS projects are now accounting for over 20% of Aquaterra’s order intake, which he described as “hugely encouraging”.
Northern Endurance Partnership
Aquaterra said its first contract with the NEP will see the company address the challenge of safely re-abandoning two legacy wells at the Endurance field.
As part of the project, the firm will deploy its patent-pending recoverable abandonment frame (RAF).
The RAF enables a vertical re-entry tieback method which delivers efficiency and assures legacy wells will not compromise the security of stored CO2, Aquaterra said.
The second contract covers seabed to surface well access services for the drilling of six new CO2 injection subsea wells.
© Supplied by Northern Endurance PThe Norwich-based firm will supply its CCS-ready high-pressure subsea drilling rising system as part of the project.
Aquaterra Energy innovation director Ben Cannell said securing both scopes of work for the NEP reinforces the company’s confidence in its specialist CCS technology.
“As the pace of carbon storage projects accelerates, the demand for efficient and CCS compliant drilling intervention and abandonment solutions will continue to grow,” Cannell said.
“With thousands of wells to be both re-abandoned and drilled in the future globally, robust, field-proven systems like ours will be essential to deliver safe and scalable storage in order to de-carbonise hard to abate large static emitters such as steel manufacture, cement production and other large industrial processes quickly.”
UK carbon capture supply chain
Other supply chain firms to secure work on the NEP project in recent weeks include Sonardyne, Noble, Altrad and Worley.
Altogether, NEP developers BP and TechnipFMC have offered up more than 30 multi-million-pound tenders for the pioneering Teesside CCS project.
Progress on the NEP comes as North Sea operator Eni begins to dish out similar work on its Liverpool Bay CCS project, which forms part of the HyNet cluster.
The Carbon Capture and Storage Association (CCSA) trade body has said the UK CCS supply chain is “primed for growth” and could be worth £2.5bn per year by 2040.
