12 March 2010 16:05
E.ON welcomes government announcement on Kingsnorth progression to next round of CCS competition

Energy company E.ON has today welcomed DECC's announcement that its Kingsnorth cleaner coal project had been taken through to the next round of the Government's CCS competition.

The carbon capture and storage part of the scheme will now undergo a front end engineering and design (FEED) study that will be part-funded by DECC. Results from the study will be publicly available to promote the further development of CCS worldwide.

Dr Paul Golby, Chief Executive of E.ON UK, said: "This is excellent news for the development of clean coal in the UK coming as it does hard on the heels of our announcement about our scoping application for the Kingsnorth CO2 pipeline.

"It's absolutely vital that we get CCS right and it's especially heartening to see that we're now getting some real movement here in the UK.  

"We should always remember that the long game with CCS is not just about Kingsnorth, it's about a worldwide battle against climate change."

E.ON's recent scoping application outlined proposals for a CO2 pipeline which would have sufficient capacity in the long term to allow a ‘Thames Cluster' of carbon capture projects to be developed, transporting 24 million tonnes of CO2 each year to storage sites under the North Sea.

This equates to the emissions from around two supercritical Kingsnorth-sized coal-fired power stations and three Grain-sized gas-fired CHP power stations.

Ends

Notes to editors:

• E.ON is one of the UK's leading power and gas companies - generating and distributing electricity, and retailing power and gas - and is part of the E.ON group, one of the world's largest investor-owned power and gas companies. We employ around 16,000 people in the UK and more than 88,000 worldwide;
• E.ON's retail business is a leading energy supplier in the UK with around 5.5 million electricity and gas customers, covering domestic, SME and industrial. E.ON also offers central heating and boiler care;
• Our distribution business, branded Central Networks, provides a reliable supply to 9.5m people in central England through 133,000km of underground and overhead cables - enough to go round the Earth more than three times - and via almost 94,000 substations. The company covers an area from the Peak District in the north to parts of Bristol in the south, and from the Welsh Borders to the Lincolnshire Coast;
• We are sponsoring The FA Cup, which is known as The FA Cup sponsored by E.ON;
• The generation business produces enough electricity to cater for the needs of around eight million homes from a portfolio of world-class gas-, coal- and oil-fired power stations;
• We are a market leader in combined heat and power, providing our customers with around 600MW of electricity and more than 1,000MW of heat at 13 sites across the country;
• We're one of the leading green generators in the UK, with 19 wind farms located from Cornwall to Kintyre. We own and operate one of the UK's largest dedicated biomass power stations at Lockerbie. Combined, our renewable portfolio generates enough green energy to power the homes in a city the size of Manchester;
• Our green development portfolio could power over a million homes and displace the emission of almost two million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year by building new onshore and offshore wind farms, biomass power stations, and tidal stream and wave power schemes;
• Our target is to cut the carbon released by each kW of electricity we generate by 10% between 2005-2012, having already reduced it by 20% since 1990;
• We have 1,500MW of renewable capacity under development;
• We have installed over 350,000 cavity wall and loft installation measures since 2006, as well as energy efficient boilers and smart meters to help customers manage their energy more efficiently;
• We are investing £50 million in new technologies and approaches over 10 years, through the Energy Technologies Institute;
• We have Biodiversity Action Plans at many of our sites which align us with the UK target of significantly reducing biodiversity loss;
• E.ON Group has announced it intends to reduced the carbon intensity of its generation by 50% by 2030 (on 1990 levels);
• E.ON Group aims to spend €8bn between 2007 and 2011 on renewable generation and climate protection activities.

For more information contact:

Jonathan Smith on 024 7618 3676