The scoping reports outline the steps the company will take towards developing final plans for the pipeline, which will go across the Hoo Peninsula and then be placed in a trench on the seabed taking it to the depleted North Sea gas fields which will be used for storage.
The final proposals are expected to be submitted to Medway Council as part of a full pipeline planning application towards the end of this year. The planned route for the pipeline heads north from the power station to the coast at a point near St Mary’s Marshes, passing to the west of Stoke village.
The pipeline will have sufficient capacity in the long term to allow a ‘Thames Cluster’ of carbon capture projects to be developed, transporting 24 million tonnes of CO2 each year to storage sites under the North Sea. This equates to the emissions from around two supercritical Kingsnorth-sized coal-fired power stations and three Grain-sized gas-fired CHP power stations, the company said.
Ed Walker, project development manager at E.ON, said: “We believe that our plans for Kingsnorth represent the best opportunity to provide industrial scale evidence of the viability of CCS and the crucial role it could play in meeting the UK’s future energy needs. Today’s announcement is the next stage of this continuing process.
“As we have done at every stage, we’ll be working closely with local communities across the Hoo Peninsula to update them on our plans and to take their views on board.”
