4th International Workshop on Offshore Geologic CO₂ Storage

Publication Overview

The 4th International Workshop on Offshore Geologic CO₂ Storage was held 11-12 February 2020, hosted by the University of Bergen in conjunction with the EU-Funded STEMM-CCS project in Norway. The workshop addressed how to develop CCS projects with offshore storage and built on the recommendations and topics raised at the previous workshops. The aim of the workshop series is to facilitate sharing of knowledge and experiences among those who are doing offshore CO₂ storage and those who are interested, and to facilitate international collaboration on projects. Over 150 attendees from 18 countries participated in this 4th workshop.

Publication Summary

Notable points arising from the presentations and discussions included the development of the Northern Lights integrated CCS project. This project is leading the way towards developing CCS hubs with industrial sources such as cement and waste incineration. We heard at the workshop that additional projects are now planning similar hubs with phased sources which brought up the notion that oversized transport infrastructure should be built to accommodate expansion of CO₂ volumes over time. Also of note were discussions around the approved provisional application to the 2009 CCS Export Amendment within the London Protocol which now makes it possible for CO₂ to be transported internationally for offshore storage. The group was the first international group to visit the future site of the Northern Lights CO₂ storage hub. Key conclusions and recommendations were agreed. Key conclusions included:

• Many offshore projects are now being planned, and many of these are considering hubs with phase-in of sources, hence needing to oversize transport infrastructure at the start, and recognising that now CO₂ can be exported internationally with new provisions to the London Protocol.
• There are benefits to CCS deployment in learning from hydrocarbon knowledge, including significant cost reductions, especially with examples from Northern Lights.
• Based on industry project perspectives, it was emphasised that MMV costs can be reduced by MMV strategies being risk-based and with a ‘tiered’ approach.
• A technical aspect from several projects was around depleted fields having the challenge of pressure drop from well head to reservoir, hence needing management of CO₂ temperature
• Inspection of legacy wells at various sites show very few wells leaking thus leakage from legacy wells may be less of a problem than first thought.