Six large-scale carbon dioxide sequestration tests are about to begin in the USA. The results, which should be known in 2009, will give the process industry a much better idea of whether or not this is a viable method of dealing with such emissions.

Illinois, western Indiana and western Kentucky alone are responsible for more that 255 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from stationary sources in the USA every year. Such sources include electric power plants, refineries, cement plants, and other industrial facilities.

In an effort to find a solution to this the Midwest Geological Sequestration Consortium (MGSC) was created. Today it is one of seven regional carbon sequestration partnerships funded by the US Department of Energy Office of Fossil Energy's National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL).

MGSC is a consortium of the geological surveys of Illinois, Indiana, and Kentucky joined by private corporations, professional business associations, the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, two Illinois state agencies, and university researchers to assess carbon capture, transportation, and storage processes, and their costs and viability, in the three-state Illinois Basin region. The Illinois State Geological Survey (ISGS) is the technical contractor for the MGSC.

One member that has developed a high level of expertise in the the field of CO2 sequestration is Air Liquide. Already a partner in several research projects in this field, including those in Canada and Poland, Air Liquide is extending its role within the MGSC project.

Air Liquide's R&D centre in Countryside, Illinois, has been working on a pioneering CO2 sequestration project since 2003. Now a new phase in this project has begun, consisting of six real-scale CO2 injection tests which will last until 2009.

As well as energy savings and increasing use of renewable energy, capture and sequestration of CO2 emissions from fossil energy is a promising avenue for reducing existing emissions. This process consists of capturing industrial CO2 emissions and burying them deep in the underground layers of the Earth. Although this process has already been carried out in several places around the world, it still requires a certain number of tests to prove its technical feasibility, its cost effectiveness and the sustainability of underground storage.

Air Liquide is to provide 19 000 tons of liquid CO2 to be injected during these tests as well as storage tanks for the CO2. The company will also provide its expertise in the design of the injection skid and assistance in analysing the results to ensure that the buried CO2 will remain trapped in the deep geological layers.

Robert Finley, project director for MGSC, said: “Since the start of the project, Air Liquide has provided its high-level scientific and technological expertise, and has assisted us in our search for environmentally-friendly solutions to reduce greenhouse gasses through geological sequestration”.

Francois Darchis, member of Air Liquide's executive committee, added: “This partnership illustrates our ability to implement the entire CO2 sequestration chain, by developing the technologies to concentrate, separate, transport and inject CO2 into the deep layers of the Earth in order to trap it definitively. Today, Air Liquide spends over 50 per cent of its R&D budget on projects devoted to sustainable development. Thus, the group is developing the technologies of tomorrow and offering its customers more environmentally-friendly solutions.”

NETL’s sequestration timeline

NETL manages a portfolio of laboratory and field R&D focused on technologies with great potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and controlling global climate change. Most of its efforts focus on capturing CO2 from large stationary sources such as power plants, and sequestering it using geologic, terrestrial ecosystem, or oceanic approaches.

Carbon sequestration work directly implements the president’s global climate change initiative, as well as several national energy policy goals targeting the development of new technologies. It also supports the goals of the framework convention on climate change and other international collaborations to reduce greenhouse gas intensity and greenhouse gas emissions.

The programme’s timeline is to demonstrate a portfolio of safe, cost effective greenhouse gas capture, storage, and mitigation technologies at the commercial scale by 2012, leading to substantial deployment and market penetration beyond 2012.

These greenhouse gas mitigation technologies will help slow greenhouse gas emissions in the near-term. They also provide potential for ultimately stabilising and reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the USA. NETL-funded activities in carbon sequestration include:

*Core R&D. In its core R&D efforts, NETL focuses on developing new sequestration technologies and approaches to the point of pre-commercial deployment. Primary objectives are, firstly, lowering the cost and energy penalty associated with CO2 capture from large point sources, and, secondly, improving understanding of factors affecting CO2 storage permanence, capacity, and safety in geologic formations and terrestrial ecosystems. The NETL portfolio also includes breakthrough R&D that furthers revolutionary and transformational sequestration concepts with potential for low cost, permanence, and large global capacity.
*Regional carbon sequestration partnerships. On behalf of the US DOE, NETL manages seven partnerships that engage state agencies, universities, and private companies to create a nationwide network that will help determine the best approaches for capturing and permanently storing greenhouse gases. Work accomplished through regional carbon sequestration partnerships helps determine the most suitable technologies, regulations, and infrastructure needs for carbon capture, storage, and sequestration.

In terms of carbon sequestration R&D, NETL has well defined goals. For example, by the end of this year it has to develop instrumentation and measurement protocols for direct sequestration in geologic formations and for in-direct sequestration in forests and soils that enable the implementation of wide-scale carbon accounting and trading schemes. By 2008, it must begin demonstration of large-scale carbon storage options (>1m tonnes CO2/y) for value-added (enhanced oil recovery, enhanced coalbed methane recovery, enhanced gas recovery) and non-value added (depleted oil/gas reservoirs and saline aquifers) options.

Also by 2008, it wants to develop to the point of commercial deployment systems for advanced indirect sequestration of greenhouse gases that protect human and ecosystem health and cost no more than US$10 per metric tonne of carbon sequestered, net of any value-added benefits.

By 2010, it aims to develop instrumentation and protocols to accurately measure, monitor, and verify (MMV) both carbon storage and the protection of human and ecosystem health for carbon sequestration in terrestrial ecosystems and geologic reservoirs. MMV systems should represent no more that 10 per cent of the total sequestration system cost.

By 2012, NETL hopes to be at the point of commercial deployment of systems for direct capture and sequestration of greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel conversion processes. Such systems protect human and ecosystem health and result in less than a 10 per cent increase in the cost of energy services, net of any value-added benefits.

Finally, by 2015, the plan is to develop to the point of commercial deployment systems for direct capture and sequestration of greenhouse gases and criteria pollutant emissions from fossil fuel conversion processes. NETL says that the systems developed must result in near-zero emissions and approach a no net cost increase for energy services, net of any value-added benefits.