CCS (Carbon Capture and Storage) aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at their source, such as power plants, industrial facilities or saline aquifers.
CO2 can be compressed into a supercritical fluid form and injected into porous rock formations for structural trapping purposes, with rock layers acting as seals to stop it migrating outward.
Capturing CO2
Carbon capture and storage (CCUS) is an invaluable method for mitigating emissions from power plants and industrial facilities, according to leading energy organizations such as Bloomberg New Energy Finance, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and International Renewable Energy Agency. They all recognize its significance for meeting global climate targets.
CCS involves three major steps: capturing, transporting and storing. Different technologies exist to capture CO2 either from fossil fuels or directly from the atmosphere, before transporting it underground geologic formations for permanent storage. These processes have already been put to use successfully in oil and gas reservoirs as enhanced oil recovery (EOR) technologies for decades; their success speaks for itself.
Colorado School of Mines researchers are making strides forward with post-combustion carbon capture and transport technology. They are exploring new methods of capturing and separating CO2 from flue gases; turning CO2 into commodity chemicals, fuels or building materials; as well as considering both economic and regulatory approaches.
Transporting CO2
Carbon capture and storage (CCS) can occur either directly at industrial facilities or power plants, or indirectly through biomass with CCS (BECCS). Either way, when extracting CO2 from the atmosphere using these methods, you must transport it somewhere for permanent storage.
Pipelines, which are widely used worldwide to transport natural gas and oil, can help transport CO2. Pipelines operate under pressure; thus enabling faster movement of gases when under high pressure. Before being shipped away, captured CO2 must first be compressed into its supercritical state to take up less space than liquids do during transport.
Once CO2 has been collected from its source, it is either piped through pipelines or transported directly to an appropriate geologic formation for long-term storage. Some potential locations for CO2 storage include saline aquifers and depleted oil and gas reservoirs; the most secure place is basalt rock formation as it contains carbonates that prevent laterally or vertical migration of CO2.
Storing CO2
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) involves collecting CO2 produced during industrial processes like steel making, cement production and power generation; transporting it over long distances for permanent storage in deep geological formations; injecting CO2 via pipelines which have ruptured before polluting local water sources or poisoning communities with toxic gasses.
CCS also poses environmental hazards due to forest clearing, land clearing and ecosystem destruction required to supply power plants and other industrial facilities with fuel for CCS projects. Furthermore, bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) projects that incinerate crop or tree biomass for energy also produce harmful air pollutants that contribute to increased emissions from power plants and industrial facilities.
Midwest geologic storage formations offer exceptional conditions for safely storing large volumes of CO2. These sites include saline formations, depleted oil and natural gas reservoirs, unmineable coal areas, basalt rock formed from volcanoes’ thick lavas spreading outward, organic-rich shales and basalt layers with temperatures and pressures above their critical points that ensure that any injection will disperse safely over thousands of years.
Monitoring CO2
Businesses from restaurants and bars, breweries, healthcare facilities and hospitals all must maintain stable CO2 levels to ensure air quality, fermentation process safety and patient protection. CO2 monitoring plays an integral part in these environments.
CO2 levels in an occupied room can change throughout the day and guidelines for safe levels are usually determined using an average reading. CO2 monitors help identify areas with inadequate ventilation so you can take steps to improve it; portable non-dispersive infrared (NDIR) CO2 monitors are ideal devices, as they use light detection to detect carbon dioxide in the air – ideal for active spaces that contain humans.
CCS or Carbon Capture and Use Storage, more commonly referred to as CCUS, is an ineffective means of delaying transition to renewable energy sources. Learn more about it in our fact sheets on CCUS projects as well as follow progress using our interactive map of Class VI wells across the U.S.