The USA’s most promising geologic formations for carbon storage are to be tested following the award of $126 million of funding by the US Department of Energy (DOE) to two Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnerships (RCSPs).
The West Coast RCSP and the Midwest RCSP will conduct large volume tests in California and Ohio to demonstrate the ability of the formations to store more than 1 million tons of CO2. The projects are part of the government’s plans to demonstrate and commercialize carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology.
“The formations to be tested during the third phase of the partnerships programme are the most promising of the major geologic basins in the United States. Collectively, these formations have the potential to store more than 100 hundred years of CO2 emissions from all major point sources in North America,” Acting Deputy Secretary of Energy Jeffrey Kupfer said.
“Tests like these will help provide the confidence and build the infrastructure necessary to commercialize these technologies, and will enable the US to continue using its vast resources of coal while protecting the earth for future generations.”
The two projects will demonstrate the entire CO2 injection process of pre-injection characterization, injection process monitoring, and post-injection monitoring for large scale injections of one million tons or more of CO2. The DOE plans to invest $126.6 million in the two projects over the next ten years, while the projects’ industry partners will provide $56.6 million in cost-shared funds.
The Midwest RCSP, led by Battelle Memorial Laboratories, will demonstrate CO2 storage in the Mount Simon Sandstone, which stretches from Kentucky through Ohio and has the potential to store more than 100 years of CO2 emissions from major point sources in the region. It will inject CO2 from an ethanol production facility will be responsible for development of the infrastructure, operations, closure, and monitoring of the injected CO2.
The West Coast RCSP, led by the California Energy Commission, will conduct its project in the San Joaquin Basin in central California. The project will inject 1 million tons of CO2 over four years into deep geologic formations below a 50 MW, zero-emission power plant in Kimberlina, CA.
The DOE’s RCSP projects are a key part of the USA’s efforts to develop the infrastructure and expertise to commercialize CCS technology. Seven regional partnerships have been working since 2003 and are now in the third phase of the ten-year initiative.
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