Back when I was just out of grad school, high tech engineering firms would undertake big projects. As time went by, more and more of these firms would hook up together to jointly finish their engineering projects.

Exactly what Schlumberger (their New Energy division), Chevron Corporation, Microsoft, and Clean Energy
Systems are doing in Mendota, CA.  Mendota is enconced in the agricultural region of Fresno, California (Central Valley).   The Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Sequestration (BECCS) project is a carbon negative power plant.

The substrate will be agricultural wastes (almond trees, among other items) with the promised yield of synthesis gas. They expect to bind up almost 100% of the feedstock carbon injecting it into stable geological foundations near the facility.

The plant should sequester some 300,000 tons of carbon dioxide each and every year, while utilizing some 200,000 tons of agricultural wastes. (So, this will replace the carbon dioxide emitted from a power plant that supplies 650000 local homes with electricity- and eradicate a fair amount of biomass waste.) The driving issue was the edict to cease all biomass burning in the Valley by 2025.

Schlumberger normally deals with power generation facilities; it’s actually one of the leading providers of such units. Microsoft’s contribution deals with the cloud, transforming the normal analog/digital power system to be stored and controlled on the web. Chevron, one of the leading integrated energy firms, will be leveraging its large scale carbon capture expertise. Clean Energy Systems is a global leader in carbon reduction technology, using principles from rocket engines to generate power. All this effort will be done by restarting and retooling an idled biomass production facility.

While this won’t be a large employer (about 30 permanent jobs),  it will create some 300 construction jobs. The go/no go decision for full operations will be made next year.

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