CALGARY, AB – Entropy Inc. (“Entropy” or the “Corporation”), a subsidiary of Advantage Energy Ltd. (“Advantage”), is pleased to provide an operational update on its first post-combustion carbon capture and storage (“CCS”) project at the Glacier Gas Plant in Alberta, Canada. Commissioning of Phase 1 (47,000 tonnes per annum of CO2e (“TPA”)) has been completed as expected with “first carbon” injected into permanent geological storage during August. Entropy believes this is the world’s first commercial project to capture and sequester carbon dioxide from the combustion of natural gas.
Phase 1 of the Glacier project includes one train of Entropy’s proprietary Modular Carbon Capture and StorageTM (“MCCSTM“) process equipment in addition to the pre-installation of waste heat recovery equipment required for Phase 2 of the project. The final total installed cost of Phase 1 was $31 million.
The Glacier project is a first-in-kind carbon capture application – capturing CO2 from the exhaust of a natural gas-fired reciprocating engine, with a CO2 concentration of 5.5%. In order to establish optimized process parameters, a multivariate analysis was conducted for the first month of operations using MEA (monoethanolamine, the industry-standard solvent).
The CCS process is currently running at steady state over a multi-week period to gather extended performance data with MEA. Performance to-date of the Entropy equipment with MEA has met or exceeded internal expectations and modeling, including the following notable results:
- Sustained CO2 recovery rates of between 90% and 97%
- Electrical loads have been approximately 35% lower than design assumptions
- Heat duty achieved using MEA (with no catalysts, no additives and linear flow path) is better than expectations. Although Entropy23TM solvent has not been introduced yet at Glacier, results to-date using Entropy’s proprietary process design have reaffirmed expectations of recovery rates, operating costs and targeted heat duty
Entropy plans to complete extended baseline MEA data gathering within the next two weeks prior to switching to Entropy23TM. Initial efficiency of Entropy23TM is likely to be determined during the fourth quarter of 2022, although establishing long-term operating costs, optimized heat duty and degradation tracking may require up to one year. Operational updates on Entropy23TM performance will be announced as various milestones are achieved.
Entropy is preparing to install its patent-pending Integrated Carbon Capture and StorageTM (“iCCSTM“) equipment at Glacier (Phase 1b) with construction beginning during the fourth quarter of 2022. Phase 1b is designed to capture and store an additional 16,000 TPA at an expected cost of approximately $12 million, which includes the expected impacts of inflation. Phase 1b will be the first deployment of Entropy’s iCCSTM product, whereby a new 5,000 horsepower gas compressor package will come directly from the fabricator with Entropy’s built-in carbon capture process equipment, reducing energy intensity and total installed cost significantly below the cost of a retrofit installation. Phase 1b equipment has been procured and is scheduled to come on-stream by the second quarter of 2023.
Glacier Phase 2 is designed to capture an additional 136,000 TPA and is expected to reach final investment decision (“FID”) by the fourth quarter of 2022 (pending regulatory approvals) and come on-stream by the end of 2023. Once complete, Entropy expects to capture in total 200,000 TPA of CO2 (over 90% of total emissions) from the Glacier Gas Plant and permanently sequester it in a regulator-approved local saline aquifer. The original cost estimate for Phase 2 will be updated in advance of FID to account for inflation. All phases of the Glacier project are anticipated to be eligible for the recently announced refundable investment tax credit of 50% from the Canadian government.
Entropy and Athabasca Oil Corp. (“Athabasca”) are preparing to install MCCSTM at Athabasca’s Leismer facility with FID for the first phase now expected early in the fourth quarter of 2022 (pending regulatory approvals). The total projected capture rate is over 440,000 TPA to be installed in two phases. The first phase is designed to capture 156,000 TPA with cost estimates now finalized. This project relies on a local geological storage zone so construction remains conditional on timely regulatory approvals. This is expected to be the first commercial CCS project on a once-through steam generator (“OTSG”), which are widely deployed in thermal oil operations globally.
Entropy has continued to advance numerous projects towards FID with the most active jurisdiction to-date being Alberta. However, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (“IRA”) has introduced significant enhancements to the incentive structure for CCS in the United States, including a guaranteed production tax credit of US$85/tonne for a 12-year term for applicable projects. These enhancements have created a stronger CCS incentive market in the United States with significantly more carbon pricing certainty, although the Canadian CCS investment tax credit helps to partially offset such uncertainty in Canada. Entropy intends to focus its investments on the markets that have the highest risk-adjusted return.