JOBS at a North-East engineering firm have been safeguarded after it won a contract to undertake pioneering work on a Governmentbacked project to combat climate change.
Amec, which has its industrial headquarters in Darlington, has been asked by power network operator National Grid to complete a study for a carbon capture and storage (CCS) project at a power plant in Scotland.
The work will be led by a team from Amec’s 100-strong design office at Wynyard Park, near Stockton.
It is the first time a firm in Europe has undertaken a project of its type on a scheme of this size. The value of the contract was not disclosed but an Amec spokesperson was able to confirm that winning the business would help to secure North-East jobs and potentially lead to it winning further work in the sector.
Under the contract, Amec will carry out the front-end engineering design, or Feed, looking at the transportation part of the CCS project at Longannet Power Station in Fife, which is being undertaken by a consortium comprising Scottish Power, Shell and National Grid Carbon.
The project aims to capture more than two million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year from the power station and transport it for storage under the North Sea.
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