US Cameron LNG shareholders advance plan for Hackberry carbon sequestration project in Louisiana
The French major TotalEnergies has signed an agreement with Sempra Infrastructure of the US and the other partners in the Cameron LNG plant in Louisiana for the development of the Hackberry Carbon Sequestration (HCS) project in Cameron Parish.
The other signatories to the deal are Japanese trading houses Mitsui & Co. and Mitsubishi Corp.
TotalEnergies said the HCS project was primarily designed for capture, transportation, and storage of carbon dioxide (CO2) from Cameron LNG.
“The CO2 will be captured by the acid gas removal units, dehydrated, compressed, and transported by pipeline about 10 kilometres away,” the French company explained.
“It will then be permanently stored in a saline aquifer using an injection well with a capacity of up to 2 million tons of CO2 per year,” added TotalEnergies.
Permits
The HCS project filed an application in August 2021 with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the construction permit of such an injection well and was the first accepted by the EPA in Louisiana.
“We are pleased to join forces with our partners to significantly reduce CO2 emissions at the Cameron LNG export terminal, thus enabling us to supply our customers with low-carbon LNG,” said Thomas Maurisse, Senior Vice President LNG at TotalEnergies.
Justin Bird, Chief Executive of Sempra Infrastructure, which operates the Cameron plant and holds the assets of two LNG export projcts in Mexico and at Port Arthur in Texas, said the company was pleased to be advancing the development of the Hackberry CO2 project.
“This project is expected to be among the first North America carbon-capture facilities designed to receive and store CO2 from multiple sources,” added Bird.
TotalEnergies noted that development of the Hackberry project remained subject to definitive agreements, obtaining all the necessary permits and with all partners reaching a final investment decision.
Expansion
Cameron LNG is also the subject of an expansion in the form of a single Train with a production capacity of around 6.75 million tonnes per annum, taking capacity over 20 MTPA.
The plant will also be subject to a debottlenecking process to increase the efficiency and output of the existing three liquefaction Trains.
Sempra has also now put the Port Arthur project in Texas back on the fast track route to development.
The proposed Port Arthur plant has all its regulatory permits and will be constructed on a 3,000-acre site in Jefferson County in Texas and with an initial 13.5 MTPA of production.
