Perspectives on the potential for CCS in the European pulp and paper industry

Book chapter, 2013

The Pulp and Paper Industry (PPI), like other energy-intensive industry branches, is suitable for implementation of carbon capture and storage (CCS) since they have large on-site emissions of CO2 and usually also excess heat available which can be utilised in the capture process. Further, since a large share of the CO2 emissions associated with the European PPI originates from biomass, if CCS is implemented the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere can be further reduced in com- parison to implementing CCS only on fossil emission sources, i.e. provided the biomass is grown in a sustainable way. This fact makes CCS within the European PPI an interesting alternative.1 This chapter assumes that world governments adopt policy measures that stimulate significant CO2 reductions and the purpose of this chapter is to discuss CCS as an option for the PPI to significantly reduce its CO2 emissions. The chapter gives an introduction to CCS in general and CCS in the PPI in particular. Some main opportunities and challenges are presented and discussed and an example of the potential for CCS in the European PPI is presented. The chapter ends with a list of main conclusions.