"The realists among us recognise that going forward for much of this century, the vast majority of our energy in the world will (still) come from fossil fuels," Wicks told journalists at the International Energy Forum here.

The challenge would be dealing with carbon emissions in ways that do not to contribute to global warming, he said.

"If we burn fossil fuels and do not find solutions dealing with the CO2, then in terms of climate change, we're in very serious difficulties," Wicks said.

"My government has said that we will publicly fund a large-scale demonstration project of carbon capture and storage (CCS)," he said.

"It will be one of the first in the world based on a coal-powered station, stripping out the CO2, transporting it, storing it in a depleted oil or gas reservoir under the North Sea."

The cost of the project was expected to run into hundreds of millions of pounds, Wicks said, adding that the technology was still in its infancy.

"I would just love it if this technology were 15 years ahead of where it is, because the needs are urgent," Wicks said.

It would probably be another decade before a number of demonstration projects were up and running, Wicks the minister said.

"Ours, I think, will come onstream in 2014. The Norwegians have one or two projects that they are developing.

"The Dutch are interested, the Canadians. The Australians are also keenly interested."

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