Olivia Woods
The $4 billion net-zero blue methanol project proposed by Nauticol Energy Ltd. near Grande Prairie, Alberta, will not be executed.
The proposed site was located in Grande Prairie County, about 10 kilometres from the city. It was expected to begin operations in 2025 after being announced in 2018.
The facility was intended to convert natural gas into methanol. Nauticol has stated that it will implement carbon-capture technology in 2021.
Mark Tonner, CEO of Nauticol, has stated that the pandemic has been an impediment for the company’s plans.
“Some of the headwinds that we encountered were just costing us too much time and money to overcome,” said Tonner in an interview. “So these obviously include enduring two years of a global pandemic and the upheaval in the capital markets. There’s significantly less appetite for risk and uncertainty compared to when we launched the project.”
“And over the last few months, we’ve been working closely with some of our First Nation partners to review alternative paths.”
Tonner stated that a final decision on the project has not been made.
“It is entirely possible that a scaled-down net-zero methanol plant may very well be proceeding on the site,” he added.
According to a statement released by Alberta Energy, the provincial government has not contributed any money toward the methanol project.
After the plant was up and running, however, the province claimed it could have offered hundreds of millions of dollars in grant assistance under the Alberta Petrochemicals Incentive Program (APIP).
“Nauticol Energy had applied through APIP and received advance notification approval, noting their project had been evaluated and met all the eligibility requirements set out by the guidelines,” according to the statement.
In a statement, the government pledged to “continue to encourage investment and creating jobs” through the petrochemical incentive program.
Tonner has stated that despite Nauticol’s withdrawal, a smaller development is still possible.
“Appetite for risk changes, need for energy security changes,” he added.
Original source material for this article taken from here
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