Carbon Capture and Sequestration

As part of our aggressive effort to transition to a low carbon economy, we are currently exploring a variety of carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) projects including post-combustion technologies to capture carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the flue gas of a power plant and place it in safe geological formations for permanent sequestration.

We believe CCS will ultimately be a critical component of reducing CO₂ emissions from much of the nation's coal-fueled generation fleet. Until the technology becomes more widespread, we believe we can make CCS more economically viable by using captured CO₂ in enhanced oil recovery.

NRG's post-combustion CCS demonstration project at WA Parish near Houston, Texas, will be among the first of its kind and is expected to begin operating in 2013. The project will process flue gas from the plant equal in quantity to that of a 60 MW unit, a level that can prove the technology's viability on a larger scale, and then deliver that captured CO₂ for use in enhanced oil recovery in nearby oil fields. This commercial-scale demonstration is designed to capture approximately 90 percent (or just under half a million tons) of CO₂ in the flue gas annually. We believe the successful deployment of post-combustion CCS technology creates a path to retrofit the nation's existing efficient coal plants and create the clean coal generation that is important to our common goals of reliable and affordable electricity, enhanced energy security and substantially reduced greenhouse gas emissions.