Energy Department Project Captures and Stores One Million Metric Tons of Carbon

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://energy.gov/articles/energy-department-project-captures-and-stores-one-million-metric-tons-carbon

[font face=Serif][font size=5]Energy Department Project Captures and Stores One Million Metric Tons of Carbon[/font]

January 8, 2015 - 11:18am

[font size=4]Energy Department Project Captures and Stores One Million Metric Tons of Carbon

Project Achieves Major Milestone by Successfully Injecting Carbon into Saline Formation[/font]

[font size=3]WASHINGTON — As part of President Obama’s all-of-the-above energy strategy, the Department of Energy announced today that its Illinois Basin-Decatur Project successfully captured and stored one million metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO[font size=1]₂[/font]) and injected it into a deep saline formation. The project is part of the development phase of the Department’s Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnerships initiative, which is helping develop and deploy carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies across the country, and continuing the United States on a path towards a low carbon future.

“This milestone is an important step towards the widespread deployment of carbon capture technologies in real-world settings,” said Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. “The successful testing of these technologies and the lessons learned support a range of industries in the region, while also reducing the amount of emissions in the atmosphere and protecting the planet at the same time.”

The carbon dioxide is captured from the Archer Daniels Midland Company ethanol-production facility in Decatur, Illinois, and is compressed before traveling across a mile-long pipeline and injected approximately 7,000 feet below the surface into the Mount Simon Sandstone formation. Since beginning in November 2011, the injection test performed better than expected, sustaining pressure increases well below regulatory limits. Over the course of 100 years, the injected CO[font size=1]₂[/font] is projected to remain hundreds of feet below a 300-foot thick shale formation that will act as a seal and inhibit upward migration of the CO[font size=1]₂[/font].

The Midwest Geological Sequestration Consortium, led by the Illinois State Geological Survey, is evaluating CCS options for the 60,000-square-mile Illinois Basin, which underlies most of Illinois, southwestern Indiana, and western Kentucky.

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[Demeter]

1. Great. Next headline will read: "Oxygen shortage!"

better to feed it to the plant life for photosynthesis and O2 production.

[OKIsItJustMe]

5. Not likely

At this point, atmospheric levels of CO[font size=1]₂[/font] are 400 parts per million, or, about .04%.

O[font size=1]₂[/font], on the other hand, represents about 20% (about 500 times as much.) If you could take all of the CO[font size=1]₂[/font] out of the atmosphere and bury it (not that you would want to—the greenhouse effect keeps Earth warm enough for us to live) it wouldn’t put much of a dent in the O[font size=1]₂[/font].


As for the plants taking care of it? How long would you like to wait? (Based on ice core data, plants are capable of reducing CO[font size=1]₂[/font] levels roughly 1 ppm in 1,000 years.)

[eppur_se_muova]

2. "projected to remain hundreds of feet below" ... unless it doesn't. nt

[OKIsItJustMe]

6. If it doesn’t, it then needs to penetrate those 300 feet of shale, and then, another mile of rock.

I’m no great fan, but… I’m not terribly worried about it leaking from this test facility.

http://www.sequestration.org/
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ccs/index.html
http://www.netl.doe.gov/technologies/carbon_seq/refshelf/NACSA2012.pdf

[NickB79]

3. At current global CO2 emission rates, that's roughly 25 minutes worth

And they've been injecting CO2 since 2011.

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. This is a “test” dealing with the output from one plant

“…Since beginning in November 2011, the injection test performed better than expected, sustaining pressure increases well below regulatory limits. …”

Do you expect them to immediately capture all emissions from every source in the world?

[NickB79]

9. Do you expect them to scale this up to capture any appreciable % of carbon in the next 30 yrs?

What this test demonstrates is that we're pumping out so much carbon presently that carbon capture via deep injection will play a very small role in any future climate mitigation strategies simply due to the inability to scale up fast enough at this point.

[OKIsItJustMe]

10. We need to start somewhere…

The latest IPCC report makes it rather clear that CCS is a key technology:
http://ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg3/ipcc_wg3_ar5_technical-summary.pdf

[font face=Serif][font size=3]…

Reaching atmospheric concentration levels of about 450 to about 650ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq by 2100 will require large-scale changes to global and national energy systems over the coming decades (high confidence). Scenarios reaching atmospheric concentrations levels of about 450 to about 500 ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq by 2100 are characterized by a tripling to nearly a quadrupling of the global share of zero- and low- carbon energy supply from renewables, nuclear energy, fossil energy with carbon dioxide capture and storage (CCS), and bioenergy with CCS (BECCS), by the year 2050 relative to 2010 (about 17 %) (Figure TS.10, left panel). The increase in total global low-carbon energy supply is from three-fold to seven-fold over this same period. Many models could not reach 2100 concentration levels of about 450 ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq if the full suite of low-carbon technologies is not available. Studies indicate a large potential for energy demand reductions, but also indicate that demand reductions on their own would not be sufficient to bring about the reductions needed to reach levels of about 650ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq or below by 2100. 〔6.3, 7.11〕

…

The technological options available for mitigation greatly influence mitigation costs and the challenges of reaching atmospheric concentration levels of about 450 to about 550ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq by 2100 (high confidence). Many models in recent model inter-comparisons could not produce scenarios reaching atmospheric concentrations of about 450 ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq by 2100 with broadly pessimistic assumptions about key mitigation technologies. In these studies, the character and availability of CCS and bioenergy were found to have a particularly important influence on the mitigation costs and the challenges of reaching concentration levels in this range. For those models that could produce such scenarios, pessimistic assumptions about these increased discounted global mitigation costs of reaching concentration levels of about 450 and about 550ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq by the end of the century significantly, with the effect being larger for more stringent mitigation scenarios (Figure TS.13, left panel; Table TS.2, grey segments). The studies also showed that reducing energy demand could potentially decrease mitigation costs significantly. 〔6.3.6.3〕

…

Decarbonizing (i.e., reducing the carbon intensity of) electricity generation is a key component of cost-effective mitigation strategies in achieving low-stabilization levels (430–530ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq); in most integrated modelling scenarios, decarbonization happens more rapidly in electricity generation than in the buildings, transport, and industry sectors (medium evidence, high agreement) (Figure TS.17). In the majority of mitigation scenarios reaching about 450 ppm CO[font size=1]₂[/font]eq concentrations by 2100, the share of low-carbon electricity supply (comprising RE, nuclear, fossil fuels with CCS, and BECCS) increases from the current share of around 30 % to more than 80 % by 2050, and fossil fuel power generation without CCS is phased out almost entirely by 2100 (Figures TS.17 and TS.18) 〔7.14〕.

…[/font][/font]

http://ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg3/ipcc_wg3_ar5_chapter7.pdf

[NickB79]

11. Which is why we're hosed.

The IPCC says CCS is vital to staying under 550 ppm CO2 (which they call a low-carbon future, lol).

At the same time, we're just now getting some positive data from test runs of small pilot injection plants.

We're a few decades late to the party...

[GliderGuider]

7. To be pedantic, it's actually about 273,000 tonnes of carbon.

The million tonnes they quote is CO2. We emit 100 times that much every day. I hope we can start using much less energy soon.

[OKIsItJustMe]

8. Well, yes

“… Illinois Basin-Decatur Project successfully captured and stored one million metric tons of carbon dioxide …”