Carleton, ENN Group Join Forces to Establish Canada LNG Research Center

Carleton, ENN Group Join Forces to Establish Canada LNG Research Center

Carleton University and ENN Group signed an agreement in Beijing on Wednesday to establish the Clean Energy Research Institute at the Ottawa campus that will explore liquefied natural gas (LNG) technology and related clean energy technologies.

To be located within the Faculty of Engineering and Design, the institute will conduct clean energy-related research and development programs, evaluate natural gas liquefaction and storage technology, research the use of LNG in large trucks, establish industrial and technical standards, and carry out LNG training.

We are delighted to partner with ENN Group on this important research and it is a natural fit,” said Carleton President Roseann O’Reilly Runte.ENN is a world leader in clean energy innovation and one of our chief priorities at Carleton is to employ our skills to promote sustainable communities around the globe.

Canada is poised to become an LNG export leader given the many recent discoveries of shale natural gas,” said ENN Chairman Wang Yusuo. “Technologies such as those that Carleton University is working on will enable the industry to be more competitive and safely transport and store this valuable new resource.

LNG is a clear, colourless, non-toxic liquid that can be transported and stored more easily than natural gas because it occupies up to 600 times less space. It is a lower carbon transportation fuel. On a well-to-wheels or total lifecycle basis, the use of natural gas reduces carbon emissions by 20 to 25 per cent compared with conventional transportation fuels.

According to Environment Canada, natural gas is the cleanest fossil fuel and can be 30 to 40 per cent less expensive than traditional fuels like gasoline or diesel, given the large deposits of shale gas recently discovered in Canada and elsewhere.

The institute will be directed by Junjie Gu in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, who began work with ENN Group in 2008 as a visiting scholar from Carleton. With ENN Group, he has explored new areas of energy conversion and synthetic natural gas, and the commercialization of the technology is expected in 2015.

This lab is a continuation of the collaboration with ENN and suits well our expertise in refrigeration, thermal energy and vehicle engineering,” said Gu. “We will focus on LNG research – from its production to LNG engines for trucks, exhaust emission control, and other areas.

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LNG World News Staff, October 18, 2013