Boundary Dam or Petra Nova – Which is a better model for CCS energy supply?

Abstract SaskPower’s Boundary Dam plant (Canada) and NRG’s Petra Nova plant (USA) are the only two commercial-scale coal-fired power plants currently operational in the world that use carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. While both CCS installations are retrofit projects that employ a post-combustion CO2 capture system using advanced amines, the two plants differ significantly in their approach to providing the steam and electrical energy requirements of the capture system. This paper presents a comparative techno-economic evaluation of pulverized coal (PC) power plants equipped with the different CCS system configurations used in these two demonstration plants, as well as two additional design configurations that may be of interest. The results presented in this paper illustrate the conditions which favor one approach over the other, and thus provide insights for planning new large-scale CCS projects.