A new report produced for the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) and published on 12 May confirmed that there are no technical hurdles to permanently and safely storing large quantities of carbon dioxide off the coast of the UK. There is also the potential that these sites in the North Sea could be developed to provide a storage hub for CO2 emissions from mainland Europe.
The report was produced by a consortium led by Aberdeen-based consultancy Pale Blue Dot Energy working with Axis Well Technology and Costain. It follows a 12 month project commissioned and delivered by the ETI, funded by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC).
Key findings of the report include:
- The UK Continental Shelf can provide a large national offshore CO2 storage resource, which can be made readily available without having to undertake extensive appraisal programmes after decades of oil and gas exploration and development activity.
- The five sites studied in detail are suitable for storing CO2 emissions from both power and industry projects around the UK.
- Only two of the five sites would need further appraisal drilling before any investment decision was required.
The project has built on data from 'CO2 Stored' - the UK's CO2 storage atlas - a database which was created from the ETI's UK Storage Appraisal Project. This is now publically available and being further developed by The Crown Estate and the British Geological Survey.
This project identified 20 specific CO2 storage sites (from a potential 579) which together represent the tip of a very large strategic national CO2 storage resource potential, estimated to be around 78 000 million tonnes. The top 15% of this potential storage capacity would last the UK around 100 years.
Five of these sites were then selected for further detailed analysis given their potential contribution to mobilise commercial-scale carbon, capture and storage (CCS) projects for power and industrial use in the UK. Outline storage development plans and budgets were prepared for each.
Under the terms of the DECC funding package, the ETI is publishing on its website the detailed reports from the project and providing access to the sub-surface geological models.
Andrew Green, ETI's CCS Programme Manager said:
"The five sites featured in the study, along with three others developed previously, could collectively store over 1.5 GT of CO2, and could be fully operational as early as 2030 which would be enough to service a significant roll out of commercial projects, including up to 10 GW of power generation and major industrial sources fitted with CCS, as highlighted in earlier ETI analysis. "This would represent the development of only 2% of the UK's national storage resource potential.
"Our view is that CCS should still play an important role in the long-term decarbonisation of the UK energy system and continues to offer the lowest cost solution to meeting the UK's legally binding 2050 climate change targets."
The report recommends that further work takes place to build the business case for CCS and CO2 storage in the UK and calls for more research to be undertaken to reduce the ongoing cost of storing CO2.
The report "Progressing development of the UK's Strategic Carbon Dioxide Storage Resource" along with detailed technical reports for the five selected storage sites are available at http://www.eti.co.uk/project/strategic-uk-ccs-storage-appraisal/
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