Graphic: Lawrence Berkeley Labs
The Department of Energy awarded $126.6 million in grants today to projects that will pump 1 million tons of CO2 into underground caverns at sites in California and Ohio. The grants are subject to approval from Congress. When private money is included, the amount spent on the projects will be about $180 million over 10 years, the DOE said. So there’s still time to write a scathing letter to your US Senator or Congressperson to tell them they’d may as well just pour money down the hole and save the trouble.
Will you have carbon dioxide underfoot? Lawrence Berkeley Lab studies the locations of power plants, oil wells, and geological formations for storing carbon dioxide. Hopefully DOE will divert a little bit of money towards LBL to help in making a US map that actually represents our borders and Great lakes well. Puget Sound and much of the Great Lakes are smoothed into oblivion. Massachusetts has gained a landfill in the ocean. Maybe this is the “homogeneity adjusted” US Map? Maybe this is what the USA will look like in the future once we bloat the underworld with CO2?
Even some environmental groups call carbon sequestration “a scam”, claiming that it is too expensive and uncertain to be competitive with non-coal alternatives like wind and solar.
Of course the concept is so simple, thanks to DOE kids web, even a child can understand it. Got something you don’t want mom to see? is your room a mess? Shove it under the bed!
I just hope nobody drops a shipment of expired Mentos down the wrong hole.
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Are we going to see a man made one of these in the future?
“Lake Nyos is the most renowned of the numerous maars and basaltic cinder cones associated with the deeply dissected Mount Oku massif. The 1.2 x 1.9 km wide lake, seen here from the south, was the site of a gas-release event on August 21, 1986 that caused at least 1700 fatalities. Wave damage stripped the peninsula at the left of vegetation. The emission of around 1 cu km of magmatic carbon dioxide has been attributed to either non-volcanic overturn of stratified lake waters, to phreatic explosions, or to injection of hot gas into the lake. “
The map of the US is pretty poor, but outline of the “major oil fields” is downright painful.
Considering that we had an ice age when CO2 levels were about 20x today’s levels, I honestly believe that this is complete nonsense. 1 million tons of CO2 is about one month’s worth of current emissions from Kilauea in Hawaii. In other words, it isn’t going to amount to a pinch of owl scat.
If you want to remove CO2 from the atmosphere, plant fast growing trees, turn it onto paper, and then bury the paper after use in an old coal mine. At least the carbon will have been used for something additive to the economy and it might turn into coal again someday.
Instead of taking an entirely beneficial gas and pumping into underground caverns I have a better idea: how about taking all the AGW enviro-whackos, beginning with Gore and pump them underground instead? Problem solved.
There is a very successful oil field CO2 sequestration project in Weyburn Canada. The US Department of Energy is also supporting this project (as the CO2 is coming from a coal gasification plant in North Dakota.)
26 million tons of CO2 (to be) sequestered, oil production is projected to increase 155 million barrels.
This oil field has a long history of other flood techniques and the project is being carefully studied. Papers have been published in Nature etc. on the project.
http://www.ptrc.ca/weyburn_statistics.php
This will end up being another “money pit”, that lets someone feel good about themselves, and the rest of us supply the money for their “ego stroking therapy”.
How about someone making a good plug-in hybrid for me to drive to work in, instead of wasting money on CO2 schemes? I could reduce my oil comsumption by 90% if they could produce a car that could run 30+ miles on an overnight charge.
Pumping CO2 underground to recover oil is smart, and is already being done, with or without government programs. Doing it to prevent AGW is just plain stupid.
Bill, I can’t understand why CO2 sequestration is even a good thing. Nobody has shown that temperatures have anything to do with CO2 change in the atmosphere. We have had a monotonically rising CO2 level in the atmosphere since the 1930’s and since the almost 70 years of temperature data since the 1940’s, we have had a warming trend over about 10 years. Nobody has shown that CO2 emissions has had even the tiniest impact on climate. It is all based on a great jumping to conclusions based on the result of some climate model that exists in software someplace and has so far shown to not have any skill in predicting reality.
I will grant you that CO2 content seems to be coincidentally tracking with land use change. What really bothers me, though, is this notion that if the ground temperature in Asia changes enough to raise the global average, we extrapolate that there has been a global change in climate rather than a regional change in land use that impacts local temperatures.
It is all so very silly, really.
This money is going to be used to remove 1 million tons of CO2 from our atmosphere? That’s it?
If there is a +3 billion tons of CO2 differential per year then it will take about 3,000 years to mitigate 1 year of the current differential. Another quality idea from our elected officials. I guess it’s really true, you can’t fix stupid. I wonder which Congressman’s brother-in-laws are going to get the grants?
Bill – Weyburn
– Looks like a Win-Win – more oil, less CO2
– how much more does it cost to get the oil out with CO2 sequestration?
Anyway, I don’t understand all the negative comments on this
– if AGW turns out to be a big hoax, then all that’s happened is that we’ve got a new way to get more oil out of the ground
– if AGW turns out to be real, we’ve got a way to reduce CO2 that actually makes money…
Retired Engineer,
Go to this website to see how it’s done (at least one version of the process):
http://www.engr.utexas.edu/che/directories/faculty/documents/rochelleresearchpres3_08.pdf
Steam would be needed to drive the compressors to inject the CO2 underground. How is CO2 collected? It is absorbed with an amine solution, then stripped with steam as a heat source. Total energry requirement is 30-40% of the power plant. In effect, steam is diverted from electricity production to CO2 capture and sequestration. Since electricity production is cheap from coal compared to natural gas, this process is economically viable (when including the value of carbon credits). The only question is reliability (which is the reason to do the projects).
I’m aware that geologists and reservoir engineers at Shell and other oil companies have looked at this extensively. In fact, one of oil companies is willing to do it today (for a fee, of course). That is, have a utility company pay them to deposit CO2 in their underground formation. Their only issue is how to write a legal contract that limits their liability.
Regarding actual leakage, I was told that CO2 would not leak out of the ground any more than people finding oil leaking out of their backyard. There would be seams of leakage, but the loss would be extremely small. In fact, capillary forces in these underground formations assure that you couldn’t remove half of the CO2 even if you wanted to.
And, yes, if this works (no reason why it shouldn’t), the extreme enviromentalists wouldn’t like it a bit. It’s funny how applied scientists and engineers discover and develop a million devices, equipment, and processes that extends lives and improve standards of living for everybody just so envirofascists can point fingers at them. I really wish people could see how humanity lived 5,000 years ago (married by 14, dead by 28, assuming you survived childhood). In colonial America, I would guess that less than half of newborns survived childhood due disease and whatnot. Most men had 2 or 3 wives due to death at childbirth and whatnot. A very nasty life.
Sounds like a solution that fell prey to occam’s razor — an unintended by product of carbon reduction incentives. Now if we could just produce carbon cheap enough we could have a (w)hole industry based on adding nothing at all to the economy.
[…] for the one problem we don’t have. We are wasting our scarce resources, pumping our cash (per Anthony Watts “Your tax dollars at work . .”) not just carbon dioxide, down a […]
Given the reasonable scientific doubts about AGW, a sensible heuristic would be to only invest in carbon reduction/sequestering projects that had a non-carbon payoff as well. This could be commercial (as in increased oil production), or environmental, as in reduction of pollution or other external costs on which producers currently get a free ride.
That shouldn’t be too hard.
Here’s the economics on the Weyburn Canada project.
Cost of CO2 (rumoured to be) $100 per ton (7 times the current market rate for getting rid of CO2 versus purchasing it) = $3 billion
Additional revenue (155 million @ur momisugly $50 profit per barrel) = $7.75 billion
Huge profit potential ($4 billion plus) but very high risk as well. On the other hand, the oil field already had a long history of different flood techniques so they had a pretty good idea of the economics if it worked.
And nobody would pay $100 per ton for CO2 today. Most likely, you would get paid $10 to $15 per ton for taking the CO2 off someone’s hands instead.
The reason to do it is government regulation, the Greens and Carbon taxes are forcing businesses into just going with the flow.
I always say “don’t fight Moma Nature and Human Nature” but another great saying is “You can’t fight City Hall.”
retried engineer says…
“Total energry requirement is 30-40% of the power plant.” We would need more power plants or bigger power plants eighter way that means higher electric rates.
“That is, have a utility company pay them to deposit CO2 in their underground formation.” Lets see if I got this right. As an electric consumer and a tax payer, I get to pay highter electric bills so the electric companies can pay the oils companies to pump more oil out of older fields.
All in the name of CO2 induced global warming theory.
Thank you, but no thanks.
Sequestering CO2 underground sounds like a great idea!
Drat, the link didn’t post…
http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/Imgs/Jpg/LongValley/30210600_004_caption.html
The map seems to be missing Lake Michigan. Did it dry up from global warming?
Let’s hope we don’t turn the world into a giant Alka Seltzer tablet.
Tax dollars, no matter what they’re earmarked for, usually end up in holes.
So I’m really not reading anything new hear.
What’s with the sunspot photo today? If the sun has dimmed that much overnight, then we’re in a heap of trouble!
THE CLIMATE BET! €2500!!!!
Let’s jump on it!!
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2008/05/global-cooling-wanna-bet/
Stefan Rahmstorf and Michael Mann are so convinced of their science that they are now ready to bet “big money” on their solid science – a whopping 2500 Euros ($3600)! Holy Moly!! Real Climate Rambos or what!
Let’s take them on. I’m ready to throw in my share. C’mon Anthony, let’s jump on this! Don’t let this slide by. We can shut these climate sophomores up for good.
WARNING!
Read the fine print!
They’ve stacked the bet in their favour, and built in an opt-out clause: If a large volcano erupts, then the bet is off.
Looks like we can call the bet off already: Chaitén in Chile, just days before the bet was made! Talk about sleaze.
Anthony please, let’s offer:
1. Let’s up the ante to 10 grand.
2. Let’s change the time frame to 1996-2005 vs 2006-2015.
3. We use a composite of the UAH, HadCrut, GISS, and RSS.
4. Bet is off only with a volcano with VEI 6 or more.
5. Chaitén in Chile not in the deal.
REPLY: Let’s see what other readers have to say.
Knowing they’ll censor it, here’s what I just posted at RC:
—————–
Holy Moly!
€2500.00!! Real Climate Rambos I see.
And the conditions you’ve put in, LOL! I haven’t seen such bravery since the French dropped their guns in WWII.
Don’t go away guys, we’ll be back in touch.
——————
Let’s see if the Real Climate Cowards will take the conditions posted above.
Let’s all pitch in and make them bet.
I’ve just added at RC:
—————-
Show a little valor guys. Is it going to get cooler or not?
1. Let’s up the ante to 10 grand.
2. Let’s use the time frame to 1998-2007 vs 2008-2017.
3. We use a composite of the UAH, HadCrut, GISS, and RSS.
4. Bet is off only with a volcano with VEI 6 or more.
5. Chaitén in Chile not in the deal.
Would you accept these conditions?
YES OR NO? Very simple.
Cooler in the next 10 years than in the last 10 years?
That’s the issue.
Let’s leave the statistics tricks out.
You’re reply please.
___________________
Anthony,
10 to 1 they won’t accept.
5 to 1 they don’t even post this offer at RC.
You know enough people, orgnaisations etc.. Certainly we can get enough to pitch in. I’m ready to throw in my share. I’m there man!!
REPLY: IMHO IF they post it, which I doubt, they’ll argue 1998 was “abnormally hot” 😉 They’ll also probably argue to use the GISS temp data only.
Leave aside the issue of whether AGW is real or not….
– the economics of sequestration seem quite good
– firstly it allows more oil to be extracted, and can make a profit in itself
– secondly, the raw cost of sequestation seems quite low
– $100 / Metric Tonne of CO2
– 1 Tonne of CO2 is emitted by 432.9 Litres of Petrol (Gas)
– so the cost to sequestrate 1 litre of Petrol (Gas) is $0.231
– here in the UK we already pay out $2 for Petrol (Gas), 50% of which is tax
– and if even part of the cost was recoverable due to extra Oil being released, then this would go down even further
Electricity Generation doesn’t looks so good
– 43kg/kWh gives – gives $4 sequestation costs per kWh!
Reference:
http://www.people.ex.ac.uk/TWDavies/energy_conversion/Calculation%20of%20CO2%20emissions%20from%20fuels.htm