Jumpstarting CCS using refinery CO2 for enhanced oil recovery

Abstract

Abstract Widespread adoption of carbon [dioxide] capture and storage (CCS) is limited by infrastructure, market, and cost barriers. Like most nascent technologies, it will be critical to overcome these barriers to fully realize the potential of CCS. Capturing CO2 from the oil refining process and using this CO2 for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) is an appealing scenario for knocking down these barriers, jumpstarting a CCS industry, and driving down the cost of CCS technology. CO2 capture from oil refineries can be relatively inexpensive when compared to other stationary sources (supply), EOR provides a market for CO2 (demand), and the spatial proximity of oil fields and refineries reduces transportation issues (cost, right of way, etc.). The oil industry should play a key role in the evolution of CCS since it has vested interests and experience with capturing, transporting, and injecting (and storing) CO2 underground. In this paper we study the deployment of CCS infrastructure to support CO2 capture from the oil refining industry and EOR and long term geologic storage of the CO2 for the US Gulf States. This region accounts for approximately 45% of US refining capacity, a large percentage of active EOR projects, and an extensive network of pipeline rights-of-way (natural gas, crude and refined oil) including over 80% of the existing CO2 pipelines. Presently, the oil industry predominantly uses natural sources of CO2 for EOR; an obvious goal of integrating CCS technology into the oil industry is displace the natural CO2 sources with anthropogenic CO2. The region is also responsible for approximately 450 Mt CO2 emissions annually from fossil-fuel electricity generation; an oil industry-driven CO2 market and CCS infrastructure could provide the necessary stimulus for capturing this CO2 in the coming decades. Our approach uses an economic-engineering model to geospatially deploy CCS infrastructure (capture, transportation, and storage) in response to a price on CO2 or a desired CO2 capture amount. The model considers and integrates each of the interdependent CCS components. It calculates at which oil refineries it is cost -effective to capture CO2, where and how new CO2 pipelines should be networked together, and which EOR oil fields balance CCS costs and CO2 credit as well as providing the best long term storage potential. The combination of capture, transport, and storage infrastructure is highly dependent on the CO2 price, both as an inducement (for EOR) and disincentive (price to emit CO2). Consequently, we examine how the expansion of CCS infrastructure could develop given differing CO2 scenarios, including variation in capture and storage costs. Our results show how a CO2 management network (capture, transport, and storage infrastructure) could develop given a set of oil refineries and EOR reservoirs in the US Gulf Coast region. The model outputs and results can be used to help plan policy and regulation for CO2 capture and storage, and help guide how the oil industry could jumpstart a CCS industry.