Richard Adamson, Managing Director of CMC, and Prof. Jon Gibbins, Director of the UKCCSRC, signed a Memorandum of Understanding that advances an already cooperative relationship between the two research organizations - both of which invest to develop and validate technologies and practices to make CCS a practical industrial response to carbon emission constraints.
“There is a strong correlation between collaboration and innovation and we at CMC believe this agreement will accelerate the development and commercialization of the technologies and solutions we need to tackle the global challenge of greenhouse gas emissions,” said Adamson.
Adamson pointed to CMC’s field research station (FRS), currently under development, as a facility where joint projects will take place. “We are building the field research station as a site to be used by academic and industry researchers as well as technology developers from around the world. This MoU is a springboard for the collaborative projects we envision for the FRS,” he said. Work at the research station will focus on developing solutions to measurement, monitoring and verification challenges associated with movement and containment of subsurface fluids, including CO2.
One of the barriers to the large-scale implementation of CCS is cost and researchers in both countries are working on ways to capture and store carbon more efficiently.
“Learning by doing is critical to get the performance improvements and cost reductions that will be needed for the second generation CCS projects. Research driven by practical experience with projects in Canada, supported by this collaboration, is going to help drive down the costs of future CCS deployment in the UK, ” said Gibbins.
This agreement formalizes an already strong relationship between the two organizations and researchers in both countries. For instance, CMC and UKCCSRC are funding an early career researcher exchange program, last year CMC sent graduate students to a summer school operated by the UK Energy Research Centre, and CMC has several times met with high-level UK delegations visiting Calgary.
"Scientists and engineers in the UK have been following Canada's leading work on CCS for over a decade. Our new phase of engagement builds on this previous activity, including a very successful young researcher exchange programme between CMC and UKCCSRC. As CCS moves to wider deployment there is a great deal to work on together,” said Gibbins.
Moving forward under the MoU, areas for potential collaboration include collaborative research projects by CMC and UKCCSRC researchers; joint workshops, seminars and webinars; regular bi-annual meetings of management teams; researcher exchanges; and the reciprocal publication of research news.