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Review of Project Permits Under the London Protocol - As Assessment of the Proposed P18-4 CO₂ Storage Sites

1 May 2016
Policy & Regulation
Storage

The London Convention and Protocol is one of the first global agreements to protect the marine environment. The Protocol promotes the protection of the marine environment by prohibiting the dumping of wastes and other matter into the sea. Under the Protocol all dumping is prohibited, with the exception of a limited number of selected wastes. In 2007, an amendment entered into force which permitted CO₂ streams to be considered for dumping under the London Protocol. The amendment was shortly followed up with a set of “Specific Guidelines for Assessment of Carbon Dioxide Streams for Disposal into Sub-seabed Geological Formations”, developed to support the National Authorities of Contracting Parties in evaluating permit applications for CO₂ disposal activities in their marine territories. As few offshore CO₂ storage sites have been permitted in the territories of Contracting Parties, there is no evidence of the application of the above mentioned guidelines to actual permitting processes. The P18-4 field is a near-depleted gas field at a depth of 3.5 km under the seabed, located approximately 20 km off the Dutch coast in the North Sea. The operator of the gas field applied for a CO₂ storage permit to the Dutch authorities in 2011, for the storage of a maximum of 8 Mton CO₂. An irrevocable storage permit for P18-4 was provided to the operator in September 2013, however the project has been postponed indefinitely due to economic constraints. The objective of this report is to assess to what extent the proposed P18-4 storage site, originally part of the ROAD CCS Project, complies with the London Protocol’s 2012 Specific Guidelines for Assessment of Carbon Dioxide Streams for Disposal into Sub-seabed Geological Formations, and therefore the 1996 London Protocol itself. The assessment has been achieved through a simple, but systematic, cross-check of the requirements of the Specific Guidelines against the contents of the application material provided by the operator to the National Authority. This involves the appraisal of approximately 1100 pages of submitted material in order to identify evidence of compliance

Technical Report

Operational Flexibility of CO₂ Transport and Storage

1 March 2016
Storage
Transport

This study has reviewed different transport and storage scenarios to reflect the range of full-scale commercial operations. In addition to a wide ranging literature review a survey of industrial, utility, pipeline and CO2-EOR operators was also conducted to obtain their insights of CO2 transport and storage. Owing to the sensitivity of these commercial operations it has not been possible to attribute background information to either individuals or their companies. Anonymity has not prevented the inclusion of real world data on exhaust gas composition from different sources including power generation (coal and natural gas), oil refining, gas processing, cement, hydrogen production, and ethanol production. It also includes background information on actual CO2 pipeline operation, including network hubs, and CO2 CO2-EOR experience in the United States. Experience from different industrial scale injection projects such as Sleipner, Snøhvit and In Salah, has been included. The study has investigated how flexible operation affects CO2 storage and the measures adopted to accommodate intermittent supply. There are a series of prioritized recommendations based on the gaps in knowledge.

Technical Review

Evaluation of Barriers to National CO₂ Geological Storage Assessments

1 February 2016
Storage

This report is the published product of a study undertaken for the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum (CSLF) to assess barriers to high-level geological CO₂ storage assessments for the Clean Energy Ministerial. This review was undertaken by the CO₂ Storage team of the British Geological Survey on behalf of UK Department of Energy and Climate Change and the Korean Clean Energy Ministry to support the work of the CSLF. The review was funded by the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change and the Korean Clean Energy Ministry. The project was managed by the IEA Greenhouse Gas Research and Development Programme (IEA-GHG). The survey responses expressed and analysed in this report are based on publicly available information and the views of respondents to a questionnaire and follow-up interviews. The responses do not necessarily reflect the view of authorities or government policies for the countries included in the survey.

Technical Report

Monitoring Network Meeting

1 December 2015
Event Proceedings
Storage

The 45 presentations and 17 posters covered a range of topics, with sessions on cost-effective monitoring of large projects, permit requirements, induced seismicity, shallow monitoring, geophysical monitoring and CO₂ relationships, pressure monitoring applications, monitoring tools for shallow, surface and deep monitoring, update on projects, and post-closure monitoring. As well as the new results and developments, new at this meeting was a group-work exercise created by Sue Hovorka of the University of Texas. This involved the groups designing monitoring plans for fictional but realistic storage sites, and then these being actually tested with leakage scenarios.

Technical Report

Integrated CCS Project at SaskPower’s Boundary Dam Power Station

1 August 2015
Capture
Storage

On October 2, 2014, the first-ever, commercial–scale, coal-fired power plant incorporating amine solvent absorption carbon capture began operation near Estevan, Saskatchewan, Canada. This was a global landmark event. Although carbon capture technologies had been pilot tested prior to this, a commercial– scale power plant now exists that has demonstrated that a number of high-risk technology and business issues have been overcome. This report summarizes the experience and learnings of SaskPower in a way that will hopefully provide insight to other clean-coal initiatives

Technical Report

Review of Offshore Monitoring for CCS Projects

1 July 2015
Storage

This report reviews offshore monitoring practice for CO₂ storage projects in terms of tool capabilities, logistical practicalities and costs. The focus is on large-scale ‘commercial’ storage monitoring and draws together published experience from existing large offshore CO₂ storage sites as well as monitoring research at experimental test sites and in areas of natural CO₂ seepages. The strengths and limitations of monitoring techniques, strategies and methodologies are discussed, and relevant experience from onshore sites are also included. Monitoring over the full life-cycle from pre-injection (baseline) through injection and post-injection phases to transfer of responsibility to the competent authority is considered. The review draws on selected examples of current or planned monitoring practice.

Technical Report

Criteria of Fault Geomechanical Stability

1 April 2015
Storage

Faults typically consist of two sub-structures: a fault core; and a wider fault damage zone. Faults in low porosity rocks tend to have a fine-grained fault core whereas faults in coarse-grained, high porosity rocks, usually have low porosity deformation bands that can develop into high permeable slip surfaces. Fault zone permeability increases with increasing fluid pressure but permeability varies both across and along faults. Hydraulic properties also vary between the damage zone and the core where gouge material is concentrated. This concentration of fine grained minerals also reduces the mechanical strength of faults. Mechanical failure or reactivation occurs either when shear stress exceeds normal strength or when hydraulic fracturing is induced. Fault deformation can be either brittle or ductile. The former leads to the formation of cataclastite (fine grained granular) and shear fractures which dilate under low effective normal stress that can cause permeability enhancement. With increasing shear deformation, fracture asperities are sheared off leading to gouge production and a reduction in permeability. Thus, in brittle deformation permeability will generally increase under low effective stresses and small displacements but decreases with increasing effective stress and magnitude of displacement. Shear fractures created in ductile deformation contract during shearing and tend not to lead to an increase in permeability. Reactivation of faults can be assessed using both analytical and numerical approaches, but assessment is usually based on the Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion. This method can be used to determine the critical injection pressure. Numerical modelling can provide predictions of fault stability at different scales and incorporate different parameters such as the geometry of different faults. Numerical methods can be effective for identifying leakage potential and seal failure especially where dilatancy and stress dependent permeability changes occur. Experimental tests on minerals and rock samples exposed to CO₂ tentatively indicate that the coefficient of friction is not radically changed, however, this conclusion is based on limited exposure to CO₂. There is limited observational data on stress regimes and direct pore pressure measurements from core samples from cap rocks and fault zones. Acquisition of key data would enhance stress regime modelling and fault behaviour.

Technical Review

Carbon Storage FY2015 Peer Review

1 April 2015
Storage

Between March 2nd and 6th, IEAGHG convened a panel of five leading academic and industry experts to conduct a five-day peer review of 12 research projects supported by the NETL Carbon Storage Program. At the conclusion of each project review, these recognized technical experts provided recommendations on how to improve the management, performance, and overall results of each individual research project. The panel was supported by Tim Dixon (Facilitator), James Craig and Samantha Neades, IEAGHG. The Carbon Storage program is focused on developing and advancing technologies to enable safe, cost-effective, permanent geologic storage of carbon dioxide (CO₂) both onshore and offshore in different depositional systems. The technologies being developed will benefit both industrial and power sector facilities that will need to mitigate future CO₂ emissions. The program also serves to increase understanding of the effectiveness of these advanced technologies and management approaches in different geologic reservoirs appropriate for CO₂ storage, and improve the ability to understand the behavior of CO₂ in the subsurface.

Technical Report

Carbon capture and storage cluster projects: review and future opportunities

1 March 2015
Capture
Storage

The study was based largely on literature in the public domain and a few enquiries to ascertain current status. Some valuable additional material was also obtained from expert reviewers of the study. Sufficient information was found to review 12 clusters in depth and a number of other less developed clusters at a more general level. Based on the results the gaps, risks and challenges faced by those developing CCS cluster projects are described. Some criteria for selecting additional cluster locations are developed and recommendations for increasing the likelihood of success are put forwards. The data and references were gathered in a working database to facilitate comparisons. A CCS cluster is taken to mean a location where the opportunity to cluster sources and/or sinks for CCS has been identified in published literature.

Technical Report

Monitoring Network and Modelling Network – Combined Meeting

1 February 2015
Event Proceedings
Storage

The objective of this project is to test near surface monitoring of CO₂ during a controlled release experiment. By monitoring released CO₂ the sensitivity of monitoring systems could be determined. Data could then be used to test and calibrate migration models under controlled conditions enabling results to be up-scaled to full-scale storage sites. The results can also be used to develop a monitoring protocol. Although this is a near-surface (<20m controlled release) deeper (100m – 300m) releases are planned.

Technical Report

CO₂ Storage Efficiency in Deep Saline Formations: A Comparison of Volumetric and Dynamic Storage resource Estimation Methods

1 October 2014
Storage

The goal of this study was to compare the volumetric and dynamic CO₂ storage resource estimation methodologies used to evaluate the storage potential of deep saline formations (DSFs). This comparison was carried out to investigate the applicability of using volumetric methods, which typically require less data and time to apply, to estimate the CO₂ storage resource potential of a given saline formation or saline system. The project goals were accomplished by applying both the volumetric and dynamic CO₂ storage resource estimation methodologies to the open-system upper Minnelusa Formation in the Powder River Basin, United States, and a closed-system comprising the Qingshankou and Yaojia Formations in the Songliao Basin, China

Technical Review

IEAGHG 2013 RCSP Peer Review Summary

1 May 2014
Storage

The 2013 international independent expert review of the RCSP had the following aims: 1. To follow up progress in addressing the recommendations of the second review in 2011 of the RCSP Initiative and their Phase III projects. 2. To assess the progress on the individual Phase III projects and consider whether the proposed technical work program for each project achieves the individual projects goals and those of the overall RCSPs. Inherent in this assessment will be the identification of any gaps or modifications that are necessary to the individual work program to address both the projects and the overall RCSP goals. 3. To assess results and key findings from the Phase III tests across the RCSP Initiative as they relate to the DOE/NETL Program goals. 4. To assess the overall technical integration of the RCSP Initiative, address the synergies between the eight Phase III projects and how they complement each other and how collectively they will provide a technical basis for future commercial scale projects in the USA. 5. To assess how the RCSP compares/compliments/contrasts with similar projects underway worldwide and how the information from these projects contributes to an international knowledge base on CO₂ capture and storage

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