More than just carbon sequestration. A carbon-negative, flexible heat and power concept.
Severn Wye is delighted to announce the launch of the Mersey Biochar demonstrator, an innovative concept producing zero carbon energy while sequestering thousands of tons of CO2.
Led by Severn Wye and Pure Leapfrog, Mersey Biochar combines innovative and existing technologies to create a carbon negative, community-scale, flexible power and heat process, with funding provided by the Net Zero Innovation Portfolio (NZIP) from the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS). The vision is for small scale biochar processing facilities to be connected onto communal and district heat networks, decarbonising heat and providing flexible, dispatchable power into the grid from the project’s innovative energy storage system.
Not only does this process remove carbon from the atmosphere, it also tackles two of the biggest challenges in the energy transition; the decarbonisation of heat and the provision of zero carbon peak demand energy. This is achieved by using biochar pyrolysis technology designed by Pyrocore Ltd, which turns underused local and sustainable biomass feedstocks into biochar, capturing carbon in a stable structure which is then sequestered for generations.
The heat produced during this process is captured and fed into a heat network, with the pilot site aiming to demonstrate the potential to provide over 4 MWh of zero carbon heat, directly replacing the equivalent use of fossil fuels. Lastly, the low-cost Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES) technology stores energy as potential energy in the form of compressed air. When deployed in combination with our pyrolysis plant, the heat is used to improve the energy storage efficiency, setting it apart from typically expensive BECCS systems that use heat to generate power, typically using a steam turbine or Allam cycle.
Energy and Climate Change Minister Greg Hands said:
“This £54 million government investment announced today will help establish a greenhouse gas removal industry in the UK, which could be worth billions to our economy, bringing in private investment and supporting the creation of new green jobs.”
In addition to the pilot itself, the project aims to bring some of the 600,000 hectares of unmanaged woodland in the UK back into sustainable management. The Mersey Biochar process is uniquely placed to utilise previously undervalued forestry management arisings, providing a key revenue stream to these operations, creating hundreds of new jobs and improving forest health, biodiversity and productivity. Finally, the project aims to demonstrate the potential to scale up deployment of our concept to remove 50kT CO2 pa by 2030, whilst creating valuable skilled employment. All of this work will provide a foundation for future place-based activity in energy decarbonisation, where community of municipal ownership will play an essential role.
Severn Wye Energy Agency and Pure Leapfrog collaborated in phase 1 of this project, undertaking a feasibility study into this approach in 2021. The partnership has now been selected to receive £5m funding from BEIS to build a demonstrator unit which will be sited in Warrington.
Other major project stakeholders are Vital Energi, Cheesecake Energy, and Pyrocore Ltd.
More details of this BEIS funded activity can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/direct-air-capture-and-other-greenhouse-gas-removal-technologies-competition
