Insights and Commentaries
Unlocking the North Sea’s carbon dioxide storage potential
15th September 2015
Topic(s): Carbon capture, Engineering and project delivery, use and storage (CCUS)
The CO2MultiStore Joint Industry Project is an ongoing study based in the United Kingdom (UK) to support the development of multi-user regional carbon dioxide (CO2) storage assets. Partners in the project include Shell, The Crown Estate, Scottish Government, Scottish Enterprise and Vattenfall. A new report has been released by CO2MultiStore and published by Scottish Carbon Capture and Storage (SCCS). In this Insight, Dr Maxine Akhurst, Project Leader with the British Geological Survey (BGS) discusses the project and the significance of this new report.
Unlocking the North Sea’s potential CO2 storage capacity by the operation of ‘multiple-user’ sites within a single storage formation
Last week, SCCS announced the findings of the CO2MultiStore project at the Offshore Europe conference in Aberdeen. The three-year project looked at the potential to optimise the volume of CO2 stored within a single sandstone formation by the operation of two or more injection sites. The research results confirmed that a regional approach to managing CO2 storage is needed to ensure optimisation of the available storage capacity. These findings have wide-ranging significance as they can be applied to other projects and storage formations worldwide.
CO2MultiStore aims to support the development of multi-user regional CO2 storage assets. Video courtesy of SCCS.
Previous studies by SCCS have tantalised us with the immense potential CO2 storage capacity of sandstone formations that underlie the waters surrounding the UK. Individual sandstone formations are hundreds to thousands of square kilometres in extent. This immense natural storage resource can be fully used if captured CO2 is injected at two or more sites within these extensive offshore formations. However, although this may have been assumed, the operation of multiple injection sites in a single formation as a storage ‘asset’ has previously not been investigated, until now.
The CO2MultiStore project has built on earlier studies of the Captain Sandstone by SCCS, combined with the published investigations by the Longannet project and industry knowledge and expertise in the CO2MultiStore Joint Industry Project. This collaborative project brought scientists and engineers together with prospective regulators, lessors and industry operators. Participation by the Scottish Government, The Crown Estate, Shell, Scottish Enterprise and Vattenfall has given a practical and feasible approach to the research.
The CO2MultiStore investigations assumed an existing initial CO2 storage operation, such as that planned for the Peterhead and White Rose projects, and anticipated a second phase “follow-on” CO2 storage project in the same formation. The benefit to the second project is the availability of the existing transport infrastructure, the knowledge gained during site characterisation and the data collected during operation of the first project.
Computer modelling of the operation of two injection sites followed well-established hydrocarbon industry techniques and used the Captain Sandstone as a North Sea case study. Our research results show that CO2 can be permanently and securely stored within a single geological storage formation by simultaneous injection of CO2 at more than one site. Computer modelling of the operation of two injection sites within the Captain Sandstone shows how the volume of CO2 stored can be doubled by operation of a second site. Our research shows how a total of more than 360 million tonnes (Mt) of CO2 could be stored at two sites when CO2 is injected at a rate of between 6 and 12 Mt per year over three decades. This substantial volume is stored in just one sixth of the area of the Captain Sandstone. As a comparison, 360 Mt is equivalent to the amount of CO2 emitted by Greater London over a period of 9 years.
The findings could help to unlock the CO2 storage resource contained within the many extensive sandstone formations underlying all sectors of the North Sea to contain Europe’s CO2 emissions. The work has informed how the UK can plan and manage subsurface geological CO2 storage, and design CO2 injection at more than one location by looking at regional-scale performance of an entire geological formation. It is an important step in the gradual process of developing the UK’s vast CO2 storage potential, which has been estimated at 78 thousand million tonnes.
Researchers on the CO2MultiStore Joint Industry Project used cutting-edge methods, which will, in future, reduce the effort and resources needed to characterise other extensive sandstones that could be suitable for CO2 storage.
Learnings from the project are also of global significance since it can be applied to any injection projects and extensive sandstone formations suitable for the operation of multiple injection sites. As a result, generic learning from the project will be of considerable value to prospective site operators worldwide.
The project summary report is available to download from the Scottish Carbon Capture and Storage website