BIG appoints WSP for next stage of pioneering, carbon negative, InBECCS project

Bioenergy Infrastructure Group (BIG) has announced that leading engineering professional services consultancy WSP has been appointed to deliver a feasibility study for a commercial scale carbon capture facility at Ince Bio Power in Cheshire – the largest waste wood gasification plant in the UK.

InBECCS (Ince Bio Energy with Carbon Capture and Storage) will be the first negative emissions project in the North West, with plans to connect to HyNet, the low carbon and hydrogen energy cluster, which was one of two clusters to receive ‘Track 1’ status as part of the government’s Industrial Decarbonisation Challenge.

This news follows the announcement in May 2021, that confirmed BIG and Peel NRE, part of Peel L&P, had successfully secured funding from the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy’s (BEIS) Net Zero Innovation Portfolio, for Phase 1 of a Pilot Project, based upon a 20 tonne CO2 per day pilot plant featuring C-Capture technology. An application for Phase 2 has now been submitted to BEIS, which, if successful, would fund the pilot plant incorporating C-Capture technology.

Carbon Capture, Utilisation, and Storage (CCUS) is an essential part of the UK government’s 10-Point Plan for a green industrial revolution, with InBECCS an important milestone project, which was named as the primary negative emissions pilot within the HyNet cluster sequence application.

The InBECCS pilot plant, which utilises unique technology designed by UK-based C-Capture – developers of world-leading chemical processes for the removal of carbon dioxide, will help de-risk commercial scale up of their innovative technology. C-Capture’s next generation, post-combustion capture technology – uses up to 40% less energy than current commercially available technologies, is low cost and well suited to the large-scale capture of CO2.

WSP has been instructed to advance BIG’s plans for carbon capture on its portfolio of assets starting with Ince Bio Power. This feasibility study is the next step in their journey for delivering negative emissions in the heart of the North West industrial cluster. BIG is targeting 2027 or earlier for the CCS plant at Ince Bio Power to be operational. However, clarity on Government support through business models for BECCS solutions delivering Greenhouse Gas Removals (GGR) is required.

The project is part of BIG’s drive to support the pathway to net zero through negative emissions technologies. The company call on the Government to commit to a sequencing process for GGR technologies with a Bioenergy Carbon Capture & Storage (BECCS) contract to provide revenue certainty to unlock investment.

Alex Young, Head of Development at Bioenergy Infrastructure Group, said:
“We are delighted to have WSP on board for the next phase of our pioneering InBECCS project. InBECCS is an exciting opportunity to deliver negative emissions in the UK’s net zero journey.
To ensure this project and others like it succeed, we would like BEIS to commit to a sequencing process for GGR technologies. We also want them to support business models that are inclusive of a wide range of circumstances, such as those at Ince; a retrofitted CCS plant powered by waste wood biomass. This will help deliver the quickest and broadest pathways to decarbonisation in the UK.”

WSP is one of the world’s leading engineering professional services consultancies, providing engineering and design services to clients in a range of sectors including Power and Energy, and has been active in the CCUS space for over a decade.

Prashant Thapar, Sector Lead for Net Zero Energy Systems at WSP, commented:
“We’re excited that BIG has selected our Energy Transition team to deliver this important study. Our experienced Net Zero team will carry forward engineering designs developed during Phase 1 of the InBECCS Pilot Project to explore deployment of C-Capture’s innovative solvent-based technology at Ince Bio Power at commercial scale.
“WSP has supported clients on their journey to commercialisation of first-of-a-kind carbon capture technologies for several years, and our team will use our learnings to de-risk the commercial scale designs from technical and commercial perspectives.

Phil Southerden, Chief Technology Commercialisation Officer at C-Capture, said:
“We’re delighted to work alongside Bioenergy infrastructure Group and WSP on a feasibility study for a large, commercial-scale carbon capture plant incorporating our innovative technology. This project is an extension of our collaboration with Bioenergy Infrastructure Group and our work on the pioneering InBECCS project, and we’re proud of the potential our technology has to support the company in achieving the first negative emissions project in the North West.”

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