On September 1, the United States Department of Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (DOE-NETL) awarded $1.5 million in federal funding for cost-shared research and development to support the initial engineering analysis and advancement of the LH CO2MENT Colorado Project, which was the subject of a scoping study launched earlier this year. The commercial-scale carbon-capture project, based in Florence, Colorado, is a partnership of Svante Inc., LafargeHolcim, Oxy Low Carbon Ventures, LLC (OLCV), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Occidental, and Total.
With the successful completion of the initial scoping study in June 2020 and confirmation of DOE funding, the partnership has committed to the next project phase to evaluate the feasibility of the facility designed to capture up to 2 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year directly from the Holcim cement plant and the natural gas-fired steam generator, which would be sequestered underground permanently by Occidental.