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Shell Sells CO2 Emissions to Soft Drink Manufacturers

Turning a liability into an asset, Shell Chemicals has announced it has begun selling to soft drink manufacturers more than 60% of the excess carbon dioxide produced at one of its plants. Read More

Turning a liability into an asset, Shell Chemicals has announced it has begun selling to soft drink manufacturers more than 60% of the excess carbon dioxide produced at one of its plants.

At its Scotford plant in Alberta, Shell previously vented its CO2 emissions into the atmosphere as a waste product. Carbon dioxide, blamed by some scientists for being a principal cause of global warming, is produced as a byproduct of fuel combustion and some chemical processes.

Shell said it is selling the carbon dioxide to a neighboring company, Air Liquide, which processes the gas so that it can be used to carbonate soft drinks. Shell said it eventually would sell 62,000 tons of carbon dioxide a year to Air Liquide.

In return, Air Liquide has become the sole supplier of steam and electricity to the Shell complex, making the deal a win-win situation for both companies. Shell used to buy its energy from the Alberta Grid.

According to Karl Blonski, health, safety, environment and quality manager at Scotford, the partnership means “we are reliant on each other and at the same time we are both reducing emissions and saving on energy.”

In August, an industry Web site reported that Shell Chemicals Ltd. had awarded Air Liquide America Corp. a contract to build and operate two cogeneration units totaling 80 megawatts of electrical generation.

Construction started earlier this summer. When completed in the second quarter of 2002, the units will provide power and 6,000 pounds of steam per hour to Shell’s Geismar, La. petrochemical complex.

In another of Shell’s environmental initiatives, Shell Chemicals said it is working to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the Netherlands: a plant at Moerdijk supplies 40,000 tons of gas a year to the Swiss firm Omya for the production of calcium carbonate, used in the whitening of paper.

According to Bert van Bodegom, energy and environmental technology team leader for Shell Nederland Chemie, Omya takes about two thirds of carbon dioxide emissions from Shell’s ethylene oxide plant.

“The deal means that we are cutting our carbon dioxide emissions in a relatively cheap way. And we are earning an income from it,” Bodegom said.

According to a company press release, The Royal Dutch Shell Group emits about 100 million tons of carbon dioxide worldwide, a reduction of 22 million tons since 1990.

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