Efforts to Commercialize CCS Techs Accelerating in Japan

　　　Tokyo, Jan. 15 (Jiji Press)--Moves to commercialize carbon capture and storage, or CCS, technologies are accelerating in Japan.    CCS technologies capture carbon dioxide emitted from large facilities such as factories and power plants, and store the heat-trapping gas deep underground.    Japan's industry ministry is set to draw up as early as this month a road map including measures to help promote the use of CCS technologies, believing that they are essential for realizing the government's goal of reducing the country's greenhouse gas emissions to effectively zero by 2050.    Public-private efforts to put CCS-related projects into practice by 2030 are expected to continue accelerating, with the ministry aiming to have relevant legislation enacted within fiscal 2023.    The International Energy Agency said in a report in 2021 that 7.6 billion tons of CO2 will need to be captured a year across the world to realize carbon neutrality in 2050. The industry ministry estimates that Japan needs to annually store up to 240 million tons of CO2, about a quarter of some 980 million tons emitted from fossil fuel combustion in the country in fiscal 2021.    In Mikasa in the northernmost prefecture of Hokkaido, which once flourished as "a coal-mining city," an experiment to use abandoned mines as places to store captured CO2 is underway.    By September last year, the city succeeded in pouring microbubble water, a mixture of CO2 and water, some 400 meters underground at a decommissioned mining site along with a mud-like substance and immobilizing them.    The city aims to produce hydrogen from coal left at closed mines, planning to store CO2 emitted during the process using CCS technologies.    "We hope (the project) will help reinvigorate the city," a Mikasa official said.    Major resources developer Inpex Corp. <1605> is set to start an experiment in the city of Kashiwazaki, Niigata Prefecture, central Japan, in 2025, in which CO2 emitted during the production of hydrogen and ammonia from natural gas will be stored in gas fields.    An issue over the commercialization of CCS technologies is that there is no legislation like the mining law, which applies to mining activities for oil and other underground minerals.    The industry ministry plans to submit legislation to stipulate, among other things, who should be responsible for the management of stored CO2 to an extraordinary session of the Diet, Japan's parliament, in autumn this year at the earliest.    Reducing costs is another challenge.    According to the ministry, 480 wells with depths of 1,000 meters to 3,000 meters will be needed to store 240 million tons of CO2 underground. Drilling work is expected to cost 5 billion to 8 billion yen per well.    In order to encourage private companies to launch CCS businesses, "support needs to be provided for the initial phase" of such projects after a monetization scheme is set up, Tetsuya Nomoto of Mitsubishi Research Institute Inc. <3636> said.    The industry ministry plans to provide companies carrying out advanced CCS projects with full-fledged support in terms of initial investment and running costs. END