Malaysian national oil company Petronas has signed a memorandum of understanding with Japan’s Mitsui for the conceptual and feasibility studies on the carbon capture and storage (CCS) value chain, including the evaluation of carbon dioxide (CO2) storage sites in Malaysia. Significantly, Mitsui is a shareholder in UK-based carbon management business Storegga, that is developing the Acorn CCS project.
As part of Storegga, Mistui is hoping to transfer knowledge and expertise from the company’s projects to Asia Pacific, including Malaysia.
Under the MoU, both Petronas and Mitsui will evaluate potential CO2 storage sites offshore Peninsular Malaysia in line with Petronas’ aim to establish Malaysia as a CCS regional hub in the Asia Pacific. The scope of collaboration covers the evaluation of other CCS value chain, capturing and gathering strategy of CO2 from various industries, competitive transportation of the CO2 and emerging technology in direct air capture.
“Through this collaboration, Petronas can leverage on Mitsui’s experience in its CCS project in the United Kingdom, which is the first CO2 appraisal and storage license issued by the United Kingdom’s Oil and Gas Authority. We are confident that the feasibility studies will bring about valuable contribution in unlocking CCS potential in Malaysia. This is one of the many efforts to establish Malaysia as a leading CCS solutions hub in the region,” said Petronas head of carbon management, Emry Hisham.
In March 2021, Mitsui announced that it was taking a 15.4% share in Storegga, which is developing the Acorn CCS project to inject and store CO2 emissions in depleted North Sea oil and gas reservoirs using existing offshore pipeline infrastructure to reduce costs.
The project, is being led by a wholly-owned subsidiary of Storegga, Pale Blue Dot Energy, with support from Macquarie Group and Singapore sovereign wealth fund. Shell and Harbour Energy are also joint venture partners in the Acorn project.
The Acorn Project is designated a European Project of Common Interest, providing essential infrastructure to help both the UK and Europe meet net zero targets. It is expected to be operational in the mid-2020s and has the potential to store at least half of the 10Mt/year of CO2 storage targeted by the UK Government’s Ten Point Plan for a green Industrial Revolution by 2030. The Acorn Project is highly scalable and overall has the potential to store 20Mt/year or more of CO2 emissions by the mid 2030’s, in a region that has been traditionally the home to a large proportion of the UK’s world leading oil and gas skills base.
In March, this year 25th March 2022, Storegga and Mitsui, signed an MoU on commercialisation of direct air capture technology, supporting the development of the UK’s first DAC facility in North East Scotland.
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