Initial assessment of the potential for future CCUS with EOR projects in Mexico using CO2 captured from fossil fuel industrial plants

Abstract

The Gulf of Mexico region (GMR) comprises the largest industrial CO2 emissions in Mexico and the location of large Mexican oil fields. The recent 2012 version of the North America Carbon Storage Atlas includes the Mexican perspective for geological storage of anthropogenic CO2 and recommends large areas found in the GMR for these purposes. The Mexican State company Petróleos Mexicanos (PEMEX) is interested in using CO2 for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) operations and has informed that large demands of CO2 (up to 50million tons of CO2 per year) are necessary to complete their plans in the near future. The Utility State Company, Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE), runs several fossil fuel power plants (i.e. natural gas and fuel oil) in areas nearby PEMEX oil fields that are candidates for EOR. In addition, Mexico launched its climate change law during 2012 that will enforce the reduction of its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, targeting between 30% and 50% reduction of its emissions in 2000 by 2020 and 2050 respectively. The present work describes positive conditions existing in the GMR for future EOR-CCS projects implemented in Mexico. There is not published work in the literature regarding matching potential Mexican industrial CO2 sources and CO2-demanding oil fields to the knowledge of the authors. Some of these positive facts are the proximity between CFE power plants (CO2 source) and the PEMEX oil fields (CO2 receptor), large demand for CO2 for EOR plans, large amounts of CO2 emitted by CFE power plants, important GHG emission sources located in the GMR and the necessity of reducing national GHG emission rates in the country. It is observed that the GMR has conditions that may motivate future EOR-CCS projects in Mexico; however, due to the actual high cost of CO2 capture technologies and the large CO2 demanded by PEMEX, these projects could be undertaken only with extra financial support from the Government of Mexico and based on expecting economic benefits from the selling of the oil recovered through EOR.