Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what recent steps she has taken to encourage co-operation between EU countries on the development of carbon capture and storage technology.

The UK works actively in Europe and internationally to advance the development of CCS technologies. We maintain regular dialogue with other EU Member States. The UK played a leading role in securing CCS’s place in a technology neutral approach to meeting our joint 2030 climate and energy targets. Last month we hosted the Government Group of the European Technology Platform for Zero Emission Fossil Fuel Power Plants (ZEP) at which we showcased the work of the Teesside Collective in developing an industrial CCS project, as well as the UK CCS competition projects. In May, we submitted a joint bid with seven other Member States plus Norway to pool our CCS research and development budgets and leverage further funding from the European Commission. The UK has also successfully pushed for the Commission to set up a new cross-Europe group from this Autumn to promote CO2 transport network projects which could access funding from the Connecting Europe Facility.