The British government may be in a position to be the first in the world to export carbon capture and storage technology, the energy secretary said Thursday.

"The United Kingdom is leading the world on CCS and the government wants to make sure that Britain will be in first place to export this knowledge to a decarbonizing global economy," British Energy Secretary Ed Davey said in a statement.

The British government last month received financial support from the European Commission for its White Rose project, a so-called clean coal power plant that would capture as much as 90 percent of its emissions and store them underneath the North Sea.

The British government said power plants equipped with carbon capture and storage technology could provide more than 20 percent of the nation's electricity by 2050.

Combined with Peterhead, a CCS counterpart of White Rose, the British government said it's invested close to $1.7 billion on commercial CCS programs.

"The government is strongly investing in developing a CCS industry in the U.K. that can compete on cost with other low carbon technologies," Davey said.