UK-based engineering group Kent has been awarded a front-end engineering and design contract for the Prinos CO2 storage project in northern Greece, under an agreement with EnEarth, a subsidiary of Energean.
The FEED contract will define the technical scope and execution plan for infrastructure intended to receive, transport and permanently store carbon dioxide in the Prinos aquifer underlying the existing offshore reservoir.
The project has secured both environmental and storage permits, making it the first carbon storage development in the Mediterranean to reach this stage. It has also been included on the European Union’s list of Projects of Common Interest and has received funding from the Connecting Europe Facility and Greece’s Recovery and Resilience Facility.
The Prinos development is designed to handle up to 2.8mn tonnes per annum of liquid CO2 by 2029. Earlier phases are expected to enable the receipt of compressed CO2 from 2026–2027.
Captured emissions will be transported by ship from industrial sources to a new marine terminal at the onshore Sigma plant near Kavala. At the terminal, the CO2 will be temporarily stored and conditioned before being transported via a subsea pipeline to a CO2 injection and water production platform within the existing Prinos complex.
Ioannis Politis, Energean’s group head of contracts and procurement, said: ‘This award demonstrates our commitment to advancing carbon storage as a cornerstone of the transition to a more sustainable planet. By partnering with Kent, a recognised leader in major engineering projects, we aim to deliver a project that sets new benchmarks for innovation and environmental responsibility.’
Paul Wetton, vice president of UK engineering services at Kent, commented: ‘Prinos represents one of Europe’s most strategically important carbon storage developments, and this FEED award marks a meaningful step toward enabling large-scale industrial decarbonisation in Greece and across the EU.’
The project is being developed in two phases, with the the first phase focuses on repurposing existing oil and gas infrastructure to enable injection capacity of around 1mn tonnes per year. The second phase is intended to expand capacity to 2.8mn tonnes annually, with storage operations planned over approximately 20 years.
The Prinos field, located in the North Aegean Sea, is Greece’s only producing hydrocarbon asset. Discovered in 1974 and in production since 1981, it is being repurposed for carbon storage. Developers have identified it as the only site currently suitable for near-term CO2 storage in the country.
The project is aligned with a Mediterranean carbon capture and storage strategy involving France, Italy and Greece, which aims to establish commercial-scale storage capacity in south-east Europe and support cross-border CO2 transport.
