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When the Schwarzer Pumper power plant was built south of Berlin in 1998,

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it was the biggest lignite-fired power plant in the world.

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It provides electricity for 2 million households in Germany,

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but in the process spews out 10 million tons of carbon dioxide every year.

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CO2 from burning fossil fuel plays a major role in warming the Earth's temperature.

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An increase in carbon dioxide in the air prevents heat escaping into space.

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Instead, it warms up the planet.

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So what would happen if this carbon dioxide could be somehow captured

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before it could escape to do its damage to the environment?

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That's exactly what engineers and scientists from the Vattenfall Energy Company are planning to do

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with what's known as carbon capture and storage.

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Carbon capture and storage is an idea of capturing carbon dioxide from a coal-fired power plant,

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transport it and safely store it deep underground.

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The idea of storing carbon dioxide underground was born from the knowledge

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that this kind of formation has been able to store natural gas and oil for millions of years.

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And that was how it was born. And we know today that we can do this safely.

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Vattenfall is building a small-scale experimental power plant at Schwarzer Pumper,

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which will be CO2-free.

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The carbon emissions will be captured while the coal is being burnt.

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In a process called oxyfuel combustion, oxygen rather than air is used

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during the burning of the lignite or brown coal.

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This produces flue gases made up of steam and a high concentration of carbon dioxide.