Energy engineering specialist Kent has been awarded a major contract to drive forward the V Net Zero project on the South Humber Bank.
The Dubai-headquartered multinational is a long-standing partner of Harbour Energy, the diversifying fossil fuels giant behind plans to link up the Immingham industrial cluster with depleted gas fields off the Lincolnshire coast.
It would see the recently decommissioned Theddlethorpe Gas Terminal and adjoining Lincolnshire Offshore Gas Gathering Systems repurposed for carbon storage.
Read more: How carbon capture can seal the Humber's emergence as industry's Silicon Valley
V Net Zero proposes to hold at least 11 million tonnes of CO2 per year, providing the capacity to help decarbonise more than 50 per cent of the Humber region’s industrial activity.
John Kent, chief energy transition officer, said:“Kent has helped deliver some of the largest CCS projects to date, and we’re thrilled to be involved in another landmark project that will play a vital role in the UK’s journey to Net Zero.”
Kent’s scope includes process design, flow assurance, safety design, and structural engineering for the V Net Zero pipeline systems and offshore infrastructure. It is a wide-ranging scope of pre-front end engineering design work.
Katy Barnes, project director at Kent, said:“I am delighted to be able to extend Kent’s long-running and close working relationship with Harbour Energy, providing multi-disciplined engineering to take the V Net Zero Project one step closer to reality.
“It is a critical element of the UK’s energy transition plans abating emissions from the UK’s most energy-intensive region. Safe re-purposing of oil and gas infrastructure is also central to the future of the North Sea.”
While not selected as part of the forerunner scheme run by government, with East Coast Cluster encompassing Zero Carbon Humber put forward, work continues.
Harbour’s involvement comes from owning the southern North Sea assets once operated by ConocoPhillips.
The upstream and exploratory arm of the Humber Refinery’s US owner sold them off in 2019.
As Chrysaor, Harbour swooped, with a name change following a recent merger with Premier Oil Plc. It began joining the dots of a transport system featuring 2,000 km of pipelines offshore, and three different systems.
Land-side the pipeline looks set to be replaced on the route which took gas to the refining complex for decades.
Port facilities could also be linked up, providing opportunity to open up storage to other carbon-intensive clusters and ship over.
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