There was little doubt about the future of CO2 storage when Austrian Finance Minister Magnus Brunner and German MP Oliver Grundmann recently visited the Port of Hirtshals.
- There is a massive need to store CO2, but at the same time there will be fierce competition, and that means we have to be even fiercer, said Søren Reinhold Poulsen, head of producing assets for CCS at INEOS and chairman of the steering committee at Greenport Scandinavia.
Greenport Scandinavia is a consortium of companies including INEOS, Wintershall Dea, Biocarb Solution and Aalborg Portland as well as Green Port North and the Port of Hirtshals. Work is underway to make the Port of Hirtshals one of Europe's largest CO2 import and export hubs.
Søren Reinhold Poulsen also explained why the Port of Hirtshals was chosen as the CCS hub.
- There is a good mindset here at Green Port North and the Port of Hirtshals, which we liked, said Søren Reinhold Poulsen.
He also made no secret of the fact that a certain level is needed.
- We need to get it up to commercial scale, and that requires a pipeline, said Søren Reinhold Poulsen.
The necessary legislation
Another presentation on the day came from Katrine Thomsen, acting head of department at the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Utilities with responsibility for CCS. She participated via an online connection from Copenhagen and was able to say that the ministry is working on CCS in a targeted manner.
- We are working on a full value chain, and we will do this together with the industry. We have set goals for 2030, said the head of department and elaborated:
- We have passed seven new laws in recent years, so it is now legal to store CO2.
Now new permits are on the way.
- We are working on granting more permits to store CO2, and next will be the first permits to store onshore. It is important that this will take place on market terms, said Katrine Thomsen.
It requires close cooperation with the industry, and this takes place weekly.
- The work means that I have ten to 20 meetings with the industry every week. We hope that Denmark can become a CO2 hub, and we do not only want to be able to store our own CO2, said Katrine Thomsen.
However, there is still no legislation that allows the import of CO2 to Denmark.
- There is legislation that needs to be put in place to be able to capture CO2 abroad and then store it in Denmark. We hope to have that in place in a few years, she said.
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