The Australian government will invest $100 million per year in a new global carbon capture and storage institute,  Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announced today, adding that   carbon capture and storage had the potential to capture nine billion tonnes of carbon by 2050. This level of effective capture would represent  20 per cent of the total reduction needed to cap atmospheric levels at 450 parts per million.Carbon capture and storage was not the total solution but was a large part of the solution, Mr Rudd said, “We have got to crack the whip and make it happen”.

Many see the move as unsurprising given that the Australian economy is so dependent on coal exports. The proposal will form the basis of Mr Rudd’s presentation to the United Nations General Assembly in New York next week. The embattled UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown has offered support, Mr Rudd said.

The new institute will start out in Australia with the objective of helping meet the G8 commitment to have at least 20 industrial scale carbon capture and storage projects in operation by 2020.

Presently there are five pilot projects, including the Otway scheme in Victoria.

Carbon capture and storage involves gathering carbon dioxide which would otherwise be emitted by a coal-fired power station or factory, compressing it for transport by pipeline and then injecting it into subterranean rock several kilometres beneath the earth’s surface.

Dr Peter Cook, chief executive of the Cooperative Research Council for greenhouse gas technologies, said the process wasn’t pie in the sky.

“This is science that has a firm base … that has been developing for a number of years,” he said.

Mr Rudd said any effective solution to climate change must deal with clean coal.

“It must deal with carbon capture and storage.

“Unless we deal with coal we are not dealing with a core part of the challenge.”

There was a great danger the G8 ambition would end up on the long list of politically pious statements which lacked any machinery to make them happen, Mr Rudd said.

“We the government want this global carbon and storage institute in Australia to be the global go-to place across the board for clean coal technologies and their application. That is the ambition.

“Rather than simply put an idea out there, we have decided that we need to have some skin in the game. So we will be providing up to $100 million a year to fund this global carbon capture and storage institute.”