Midwest Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership cancels Ohio CCS project despite DOE funding

The 35-member Midwest Regional Carbon Sequestration Project (MRCSP) has cancelled a $92.8m proposal to inject one million tons of carbon dioxide over four years from an ethanol plant in Greenville, western Ohio.

Battelle Memorial Institute, a major, non-profit research and development organisation which manages MRCSP, issued a terse communiqué saying the decision was based on “business considerations.”

“That’s all I can tell you,” Katy Delaney, a Battelle spokeswoman says in response to queries from Recharge.

The move came after the US Energy Department in May 2008 awarded MRCSP $61m to fund the third phase of carbon capture and storage research over 10 years at the Greenville site.

The CO2 would have been injected into the Mount Simon Sandstone formation, which is more than 3,000 feet beneath the surface. It stretches across much of the Midwest region and has the potential to store more than 100 years of CO2 emissions from major point sources in the region, according to DOE.

Specifically, the third phase, for which MRCSP members would have contributed almost $32m, was to validate that the injection and storage could be done on a safe, permanent and economic basis.

Local officials and state representatives had increasingly opposed the project fearing it would lower property values and increase seismic activity.

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Department of Energy and NETL Web Sites

DOE and NETL web sites, and those of their seven Carbon Sequestration Regional Partnerships, have a wealth of information on all aspects of CCS. These sites can be accessed directly or through http://www.energy.gov and http://www.NETL.gov. NETL’s Sequestration Roadmap can be found on http://www.netl.doe.gov/technologies/carbon_seq/refshelf/project%20portfolio/2007/2007Roadmap.pdf
DOE/NETL’s National Carbon Sequestration Database and Geographical Information System (NatCarb) is especially valuable and can be accessed through http://www.natcarb.org. The seven Carbon Sequestration Regional Partnerships web sites can be accessed directly:
 Big Sky Partnership (Big Sky) at http://www.bigskyco2.org
 Midwest Geological Sequestration Consortium (MGSC) at http://www.sequestration.org
 Midwest Regional Partnership (MRCSP) at http://www.mrscp.org
 Plains Partnership (PCOR) at http://www.undeerc.org/pcor/
 South East Partnership (SECARB) at http://www.secarbon.org
 South West Partnership (SWP) at http://www.southwestcarbonpartnership.org
 West Coast Partnership (WESTCARB) at http://www.westcarb.org
USCSC educational papers on CCS can be accessed at http://www.uscsc.org

Local Opposition to Proposed CO2 Sequestration Project Grows in Darke County OH

Photo by Lyn Bliss /Advocate Photo


Darke County, OH (Greenville, OH)

Citizens Against CO2 Sequestration - the grassroots movement in Darke County, Ohio is growing to send raise public awareness of the proposed large-scale CO2 sequestration EXPERIMENT planned for Darke County and the risks to their community.

Signs are going up all over the county.

Thank you to all who are showing your opposition to the EXPERIMENTAL CO2 Sequestration project planned for our community! Talk to your friends and neighbors, plan to attend The Stop CO2 Sequestration rally and our Call To Action Meeting on Monday, June 29, at the All Seasons Place on Sebring Warner Road at 7 PM.

A public Stop CO2 Sequestration Rally is planned for Saturday morning - June 27 - Annie Oakley Park in downtown Greenville at 10 am - more details coming soon. Signature Petitons, information will be available as well as Yard Signs. Yard Signs can be purchased for $5 each.
Plan to Attend - Homemade signs welcome.

Signs are available from Isabel Culbertson or by emailing - StopExperimentalCO2Projects@yahoo.com

Click on this link to read the article in The Daily Advocate and to access their CO2 blog.

If you know of other newspapers hosting their own blog about CO2 sequestration projects please let us know. To date, we believe The Daily Advocate in Greenville, Ohio is the only one.

Cranfield Mississippi - Case Study: Monitoring an EOR Project to Document Sequestration Value

Large volume, Phase III via existing pipelines - EOR project

Click here to be taken to the PowerPoint

From the SECARB site: http://seesorg.org/Hill_10_15_part_1.pdf

The project will inject CO₂ at the rate of one million tons per year, for up to 1.5 years, into brine up to 10,000 feet below the land surface near the Cranfield oil field about 15 miles east of Natchez, Miss. Experimental equipment will measure the ability of the subsurface to accept and retain CO₂. The study will be supported by Denbury Resources’ CO₂ enhanced oil recovery operations at Cranfield. Denbury Resources will supply CO₂ from its Jackson Dome.

DOE's Carbon Sequestration Program

DOE's Carbon Sequestration Program

DOE's Carbon Sequestration Program involves two key elements for technology development:

Core Research and Development

Demonstration and Deployment

The Core Research & Development part contains 5 different areas of focus for developing the technology to sequester CO2 -

1. CO₂ Capture

2. Carbon Storage

3. Monitoring, Mitigation, and Verification

4. Non-CO₂ Greenhouse Gas Control

5. Breakthrough Concepts.

Core R&D is accomplished through laboratory and pilot-scale research aimed at developing new technologies and new systems and it provides technology solutions which support Demonstration and Deployment in the areas of Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnerships, FutureGen, and other commercial opportunities.

Experiences with Demonstration and Deployment provide "lessons learned" which are used by Core R&D in developing further technology solutions.

From the WEB SITE -

What is Carbon Sequestration?

Carbon sequestration encompasses the processes of capture and storage of CO₂ that would otherwise reside in the atmosphere for long periods of time. DOE is investigating a variety of carbon sequestration options. Geologic sequestration involves the separation and capture of CO₂ at the point of emissions followed by storage in deep underground geologic formations. Terrestrial sequestration involves the net removal of CO₂ from the atmosphere by plants and microorganisms and its storage in vegetative biomass and in soils. There is significant opportunity to use terrestrial sequestration both to reduce CO₂ and to obtain the ancillary benefits such as habitat and water quality improvements that often result from such projects. The DOE is focusing its efforts for terrestrial sequestration on increasing carbon uptake through reforestation and amendment of minelands and other damaged soils. In addition, regional efforts are examining terrestrial sequestration through various land management techniques including no-till farming and wetland restoration.

It is expected that large numbers of new power plants and fuel processing facilities will be built in the coming decades, in both the developing world as well as in some areas of the developed world, such as the U.S. and Canada. These new facilities, along with existing plants having the potential for being appropriately retrofitted, will create ample opportunities for deploying efficient and cost effective CO₂ capture technologies. DOE's CO₂ capture efforts seek to cost effectively capture and purify CO₂ using post-combustion, pre-combustion, or oxy-combustion technologies for carbon capture.

Geologic sequestration is defined as the placement of CO₂ into an underground repository in such a way that it will remain permanently stored.

DOE is investigating five types of underground formations for geologic sequestration, each with different challenges and opportunities for CO₂ sequestration: (1) mature oil and natural gas reservoirs, (2) deep unmineable coal seams, (3) deep saline formations, (4) oil- and gas-rich organic shales, and (5) basalt formations.

The process of CO₂ sequestration includes monitoring, mitigation, and verification (MM&V) as well as risk assessment at the sequestration site. DOE's MM&V efforts focus on development and deployment of technologies that can provide an accurate accounting of stored CO₂ and a high level of confidence that the CO₂ will remain permanently sequestered. Effective application of these MM&V technologies will ensure the safety of sequestration projects with respect to both human health and the environment, and provide the basis for establishing carbon credit trading markets for sequestered CO₂. Risk assessment research focuses on identifying and quantifying potential risks to humans and the environment associated with CO₂ sequestration and helping to ensure that these risks remain low.