PENN VALLEY, PA, US, March 14, 2022 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Armed with a deep-pockets partner and a large anchor shipper, a midstream infrastructure developer spent months in the Midwest talking with landowners, community leaders, and other interested stakeholders about their plans to transport carbon dioxide from ethanol and fertilizer plants to permanently store underground in Illinois.

Some 55 public meetings later, Navigator CO2 Ventures found friends of the Heartland Greenway system, and fence-sitters who were educated on the merits of the $2-$3 billion, 1,200-mile line.

As is the case with any major project, Navigator encountered some people who dislike any project that does not solely include windmills and solar panels.

“Our customers want to lower their carbon intensity, their emissions, and they want to make themselves more attractive to ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) investors,” said David Giles, Navigator President and Chief Operating Officer.

Giles will explain Heartland Greenway in depth at the Appalachian Hydrogen & Carbon Capture Conference III, slated for April 21, at the Hilton Garden Inn Pittsburgh Southpointe.

The one-day program will be presented by H2-CCS Network and ShaleDirectories.com.
Heartland Greenway will capture, transport and permanently sequester CO2 from ethanol and fertilizer facilities located in South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, and Illinois.

The Heartland Greenway concept was sufficient to secure BlackRock’s Global Energy & Power Infrastructure Fund III to back Navigator’s efforts.

Valero, which owns-operates 13 ethanol plants in the Midwest, has committed the emissions from eight facilities to Heartland Greenway, according to Giles. The optimum number of carbon sources for the line is 10 to 20.

“We are pleased to have Navigator CO2 Ventures present at our Appalachian Hydrogen & Carbon Capture Conference III,” stated Tom Gellrich, Founder, H2 CCS Network. He further added,” Navigator’s project certainly contributes to reducing U.S. carbon dioxide emissions.”

The pipeline (varying from six inches to 24 inches in diameter, growing larger as the Illinois sequestration point is reached) will flow 10 million metric tons of liquid CO2 annually. That figure, with the addition of more line compression, can grow to 15 MMTA. The project will be brought online in phases, beginning in 2025.

“We are offering potential customers the option of us helping them finance the carbon dioxide capture equipment,” Giles said. “Some customers are interested, others want to build their own system, with us taking the CO2 away.”

A silent partner in this project, as in all such projects, is the Federal government. The 45Q federal tax credit accrues to the owner of the carbon capture equipment at an eventual price of $50 per ton for CO2 kept from the atmosphere and stored underground. The 45Q program is an important economic driver in the development of the project as the credit goes directly to the producers.

Biorefineries (facilities that convert biomass to energy and other products) are ideal to tap for CO2 because, unlike fossil fuel-fired power plants, their emissions are almost pure CO2.

Giles is speaking at the Appalachian Hydrogen and Carbon Capture Conference III to spread awareness about Heartland Greenway, which will be built using union workers, he added.

“We see our project as offering benefits to industry, to the environment, and it will put a lot of people to work. And I don’t see it getting built without union workers.”

Joe Barone
Shale Directories
610-764-1232
jbarone@shaledirectories.com