Seven global energy companies, including Statoil, are collaborating to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in production and use of fossil fuels.
This three-and-a-half-year carbon dioxide capture project (CCP) has a budget of USD 20 million.
Participants in Statoil's programme for strategic corporate technology in Trondheim will be helping to develop solutions which can separate carbon dioxide and inject it back below ground.
The CCP represents a natural extension of the group's efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, says Else Hafstad, Statoil's manager for the project.
She points to the experience gained by Statoil from injecting carbon dioxide into a deep geological formation on its Sleipner East field in the North Sea.
The group has annually disposed of almost one million tonnes of the greenhouse gas in this way since 1996 – corresponding to 10 per cent of Norway's offshore carbon dioxide emissions.
Involving the Norwegian supplies industry and researchers in the CCP will be important, Ms Hafstad notes.
Together with Norsk Hydro, Statoil will be looking after Norwegian-related issued in the project.
See also the joint press release from the partners.