Abstract
Carbon dioxide (CO2) geological storage traditionally involves capturing a CO2 stream from a point source such as a power station or from cement, steel, or natural gas processing plant, transporting it and compressing it, prior to injection as a supercritical phase into a suitable geological reservoir overlain by a cap-rock or seal. One of the main perceived risks in CO2 geological storage is migration or leakage of the buoyant CO2 stream through the seal, via faults or fractures, or other migration out of the storage complex. Injection of CO2 dissolved in water may be one solution to mitigate the leakage risk. This approach could take advantage of large volumes of wastewater already being reinjected into saline aquifers worldwide but particularly in North America, thus reducing costs. This study examines the potential to “piggyback” off the existing wastewater injection industry as a novel carbon storage option.
Highlights
Permanent subsurface sequestration of CO2 captured from power stations and industrial sources is one of the major options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions [1]
The high cost associated with CO2 capture, separation, compression, transportation and injection is another key hurdle for more rapid deployment of CO2 geological sequestration globally [9]
In this paper we examine the feasibility of using existing water reinjection as a potentially niche opportunity to provide low-cost carbon storage by presaturating the water with CO2 prior to its injection
Summary
Permanent subsurface sequestration of CO2 captured from power stations and industrial sources is one of the major options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions [1]. The tendency is, for the plume to sink Thereby, this approach significantly reduces leakage risk compared with storage of supercritical CO2 in reservoir formation water resulting in a multiphase system driven by buoyancy. In this paper we examine the feasibility of using existing water reinjection (e.g., disposal of coproduced oil and gas reservoir waters or from enhanced oil recovery or other mining activities) as a potentially niche opportunity to provide low-cost carbon storage by presaturating the water with CO2 prior to its injection. The potential CO2 reinjection using all this water equates to ~34,903,000 tCO2/y for the United States and ~12,556,000 tCO2/y for Canada These indicative amounts are based on an average salinity of 30,000 mg/L, injection pressure of 16,560 kPa (depth 800 m and 90% of kPa/m) and temperature of ◦C. Volume m3/Year 22,100,000 20,900,000 19,200,000 16,700,000 15,600,000 14,400,000 13,500,000 12,600,000 12,200,000 11,600,000 10,800,000 9,420,000 8,870,000 8,340,000 5,970,000 5,170,000 4,330,000 3,400,000 377,000 215,477,000
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