Chevron and Microsoft team up to create carbon negative power - Smart Energy Decisions

Commercial, Industrial, Sourcing Renewables  -  March 11, 2021

Chevron and Microsoft team up to create carbon negative power

Chevron Corporation announced March 4 a new collaboration with Microsoft that will focus on developing carbon negative power using carbon capture and sequestration technology.

The pair joined up with Schlumberger New Energy and Clean Energy Systems for the development of the bioenergy with carbon capture and sequestration (BECCS) plant in Mendota, Calif. The plant will generate electricity by converting agricultural waste biomass into renewable synthesis gas that then is mixed with oxygen in a combustor to create power.

“Chevron is helping to advance a lower-carbon future,” Bruce Niemeyer, Chevron's vice president of strategy and sustainability, said in a statement. “We look forward to leveraging our experience working in California, building projects which can be repeated and operating large-scale carbon capture and storage operations. The project is aligned with our focus on investments in low-carbon technology to enable commercial solutions.”

The process is designed to ultimately result in net-negative carbon emissions by consuming CO2 to produce power and then permanently storing the CO2 produced throughout the process. More than 99% of the carbon from the process will be captured for permanent storage and injected underground into nearby deep geologic formations.

Once completed, the plant is expected to remove approximately 300,000 tons of CO2 annually. Additionally, the facility is expected to use approximately 200,000 tons of agricultural waste annually, improving the air quality in California’s Central Valley and contributing to the California Air Resources Control Board’s plan to begin phasing out almost all agricultural burning in the Valley by 2025. The bioenergy is designed to operate without routine emissions of nitrous oxide, carbon monoxide or particulates from combustion produced by conventional biomass plants.


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