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Earth Power

Can Pumping CO2 Into California's Oil Fields Help Stop Global Warming? (yahoo.com) 83

Posted by EditorDavid from the opposite-of-emissions dept.
America's Environmental Protection Agency "has signed off on a California oil company's plans to permanently store carbon emissions deep underground to combat global warming," reports the Los Angeles Times: California Resources Corp., the state's largest oil and gas company, applied for permission to send 1.46 million metric tons of carbon dioxide each year into the Elk Hills oil field, a depleted oil reservoir about 25 miles outside of downtown Bakersfield. The emissions would be collected from several industrial sources nearby, compressed into a liquid-like state and injected into porous rock more than one mile underground.

Although this technique has never been performed on a large scale in California, the state's climate plan calls for these operations to be widely deployed across the Central Valley to reduce carbon emissions from industrial facilities. The EPA issued a draft permit for the California Resources Corp. project, which is poised to be finalized in March following public comments. As California transitions away from oil production, a new business model for fossil fuel companies has emerged: carbon management. Oil companies have heavily invested in transforming their vast network of exhausted oil reservoirs into a long-term storage sites for planet-warming gases, including California Resources Corp., the largest nongovernmental owner of mineral rights in California...

[Environmentalists] say that the transportation and injection of CO2 — an asphyxiating gas that displaces oxygen — could lead to dangerous leaks. Nationwide, there have been at least 25 carbon dioxide pipeline leaks between 2002 and 2021, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation. Perhaps the most notable incident occurred in Satartia, Miss., in 2020 when a CO2 pipeline ruptured following heavy rains. The leak led to the hospitalization of 45 people and the evacuation of 200 residents... Under the EPA draft permit, California Resources Corp. must take a number of steps to mitigate these risks. The company must plug 157 wells to ensure the CO2 remains underground, monitor the injection site for leaks and obtain a $33-million insurance policy.
Canadian-based Brookfield Corporation also invested $500 million, according to the article, with California Resources Corp. seeking permits for five projects — more than any company in the nation. "It's kind of reversing the role, if you will," says their chief sustainability officer. "Instead of taking oil and gas out, we're putting carbon in."

Meanwhile, there's applications for "about a dozen" more projects in California's Central Valley that could store millions of tons of carbon emissions in old oil and gas fields — and California Resources Corp says greater Los Angeles is also "being evaluated" as a potential storage site.
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Can Pumping CO2 Into California's Oil Fields Help Stop Global Warming? More

Can Pumping CO2 Into California's Oil Fields Help Stop Global Warming?

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  • No (Score:2, Insightful)

    by NFN_NLN ( 633283 )

    Betteridge's law (of headlines) is an adage that states "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no." The sweeping generalization refers to the poor journalistic practice of writing sensational headlines in the form of a question in order to compensate for the author's lack of facts.

    https://www.techtarget.com/wha... [techtarget.com]

  • Oh yeah, great idea (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @12:54AM (#64159047)

    Store millions of tons of liquid CO2 underground in an quake zone, and the next time the ground fractures, you get something like Lake Nyos [wikipedia.org].

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by thegarbz ( 1787294 )

      Yes because depleted oil fields are well known as being geologically unstable and incapable of holding such a material. /s

      • Re:Oh yeah, great idea (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 15, 2024 @04:21AM (#64159185)

        Yes because depleted oil fields are well known as being geologically unstable and incapable of holding such a material. /s

        Would that be before or after they've been fracked to hell by oil companies?

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by thegarbz ( 1787294 )

          Would that be before or after they've been fracked to hell by oil companies?

          Not at all, oil fields are oil fields, they don't need to be fracked. We give a different name to reservoirs which rely on fracking for recovery and precisely zero of these have ever been proposed to store CO2.

      • Re:Oh yeah, great idea (Score:4, Informative)

        by GrumpySteen ( 1250194 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @09:00AM (#64159469)

        https://earthquaketrack.com/us-ca-bakersfield/recent [earthquaketrack.com]

        It's amusing that you think that the area around Bakersfield is even remotely close to being geologically stable.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by DarkSkiesAhead ( 562955 )
      I think you have confused the California coastline with other parts of the state. Not all of CA is an earthquake zone. The Central Valley has no no known faults and while there are faults east and west of it, there has been relatively little damage in the Central Valley from even the worst of the San Andreas events.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by drinkypoo ( 153816 )

        Not all of CA is an earthquake zone

        Sure, you've got the Klamath Knot...

        The Central Valley has no no known faults

        It's bordered by faults, literally, and one of those is the San Andreas, which you may have heard of.

        Every part of California is a quake zone, either with a fault running through it, or a massive fault running next to it.

    • Re:Oh yeah, great idea (Score:5, Interesting)

      by CaptQuark ( 2706165 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @03:06AM (#64159127)

      If the natural gas, a much less dense gas, in gas fields in that area stay stable underground during earthquakes, what makes you think the CO2 wouldn't stay underground too?

      • Re:Oh yeah, great idea (Score:4, Informative)

        by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @04:14AM (#64159169)

        Indeed. Methane is also much more geologically mobile, yet remained in the ground for millions of years.

        The CO2 is injected as a super-critical fluid, not a gas, and it reacts with the surrounding rock to form carbonates.

        There are concerns about the pipelines leaking, but once the CO2 is in the ground, it stays there.

        This project is the first big one for California, but Texas and Oklahoma have been doing CO2 injections for years.

        Enhanced oil recovery [wikipedia.org]

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      They do not care about climate change, safety or really anything besides money.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by MacMann ( 7518492 )

        They do not care about climate change, safety or really anything besides money.

        Then find ways to make reducing CO2 emissions profitable.

  • About a dozen or so?? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Art Challenor ( 2621733 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @12:54AM (#64159049)
    US produces about 5000 million metric tons annually. I don't know how many sites there might be beyond the ones hinted at, but if they are only sequestering about 1.5 million the risk better be low because the impact is minimal. That said, there are no large fixes, so if there's the potential for a few hundred of these it might be worthwhile.

    • Re:About a dozen or so?? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by RossCWilliams ( 5513152 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @01:28AM (#64159075)
      I had the same reaction without knowing about the incident you sited. Whenever a company promises to indefinitely monitor something it that doesn't generate a stream of revenue to pay for it is a false promise. The company has to get its revenue to pay for the monitoring from somewhere and that means either higher prices or reduced profits for its ongoing operations.

      • reduced profits

        Stop, I can barely breathe I'm laughing so hard.

      • Who said that storing the CO2 in the old oil reservoir is going to be for free? Do you think oil companies will do it for charity? There will be plenty of money involved to pay for the monitoring as long as the business is ongoing. The problem you mention will come long after the reservoir is full and sealed and all the monitoring equipment broken down.

      • I had the same reaction without knowing about the incident you sited. Whenever a company promises to indefinitely monitor something it that doesn't generate a stream of revenue to pay for it is a false promise. The company has to get its revenue to pay for the monitoring from somewhere and that means either higher prices or reduced profits for its ongoing operations.

        I'm sure somebody more manipulative and with less attachment to their soul will be happy to investigate using the carbon credit system to make this a forever revenue stream. Perhaps the United States Government could supply a renter's fee, most likely to the tune of millions or billions per fiscal quarter, to keep this CO2 in the ground?

    • It's greenwashing (Score:5, Insightful)

      by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @01:34AM (#64159079)
      Just like the plastic industry did with recycling. They're at the point where the effects of climate change, in particular the droughts in the extreme weather in Florida and the inability to get insurance there, mean that voters can't pretend climate change isn't real anymore.

      So they're going to shift gears and start doing pointless and idiotic carbon capture nonsense to make it look like we don't need to make any changes to our power supply or how we use energy.

      It'll work. Older voters still very much dominate voting and they are extremely opposed to even the most minimal or modest lifestyle changes.

  • Yay Capitalism! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Gleenie ( 412916 ) * <simon.c.green @ g m a il.com> on Monday January 15, 2024 @12:58AM (#64159053)

    Profiting from the solution to a problem we profited from causing. I love capitalism.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by iAmWaySmarterThanYou ( 10095012 )

      According to the article they'll get an $85/ton federal tax credit which is basically hard cash to the bottom line. Plus if they can get some other business to pay them to bury that company's co2 they'll charge for it but it doesn't sound like they have any customers lined up.

      By the math, this pays itself off in about 4-5 years to cover the $500m initial investment. All of it tax dollars. After year 5 it's pure free money.

      It won't have any impact on the environment, no one has actually asked them to prov

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Z80a ( 971949 )

      On the end of the day, you have to remember where the money comes from.

    • You expect someone to work for free? I mean for years you demanded oil and gas, and now you're suggesting that providing you with what you wanted was bad for the world so you deserve a handout?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by sinij ( 911942 )

        You expect someone to work for free?

        When you think only 140 characters at a time, that is the result you get.

    • Re:Yay Capitalism! (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @05:48AM (#64159283)

      Unfettered Capitalism is and always was about transferring the money of the clueless masses into the pockets of the already far too rich. Carefully controlled capitalism makes sure nobody gets too rich and hence has some merit and some longer-term stability. But the rich do not want that one.

  • In this context the "chief sustainability officer" is responsible for sustaining the company's bottom line.

  • What happens when you shake a carbonated drink bottle?

  • a resounding NO (Score:3, Insightful)

    by roman_mir ( 125474 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @01:24AM (#64159071) Homepage Journal

    No, of course not. 50 billion tons of CO2 is added to the atmosphere by human activity per year, they won't pump even a 1000 of 1 percent into it.

    • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Yeah, that reminds me of the first person to refine petroleum into gasoline/benzine as an energy source for an engine.

      Naysayer, "You think that stuff can power engines that will replace horses? Do you know how many horses there are?"

      Yeah, the pilot program is just a drop in the ocean so why even try something new? Using your numbers they would have to do this 100,000 times. Luckily there are over 5 million oil wells in the world so there are plenty to evaluate as suitable geography.

  • I seriously doubt this CO2 will stay there long...

    Quakes, ground movements, gaps in sealing ...

    The only acceptable CO2 removal for me is artificial fuel and biomass..

  • less than 2 million metric ton per year (Score:3)

    by aepervius ( 535155 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @04:19AM (#64159177)
    Less than 1/3200 amount of emission of the USA. You would need 3200 of such project to have make the USA contribution to GW zero, and 1/18000 of global emission. If that CO2 is captured at the source , OK fine that is some we avoid in the atmosphere, but that's an drop in an ocean...

  • If you pump enough CO2 into the area where people are working and thus nobody can work anymore without dying...

  • "It's keeping to the same old PR green-washing role, if you will," says their chief sustainability officer. "As well as taking oil and gas out to generate billions of tonnes of CO2, we're also putting a little bit of that carbon in."

    T,IFTFY.

  • greenwashing (Score:4, Insightful)

    by BeaverCleaver ( 673164 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @06:59AM (#64159325)

    In the oil industry it's called "Enhanced Oil Recovery" or EOR. They don't do it to be "green," they do it because injecting CO2 into an oil well allows more oil to be extracted: https://www.energy.gov/sites/d... [energy.gov]

    So it does fuck-all for the climate, and the end result is more fossil fuels for burning. If this sort of behaviour gets a government handout, it's time to change the laws.

    • Was going to say this, but it is typically alternated with water / waste-water, so the loss of water is also an issue. You just have to be very careful to not pump so much that you damage the formation itself.

  • You burn oil to release energy. Stable hydrocarbons are consumed.

    It takes energy to scrub CO2 and produce unstable liquid/gas.

    This is a complete waste of energy. Every gallon "reclaimed" is a gallon wasted.

    Better: improve efficiency, find alternative fuels, save taxpayer dollars

  • The answer is, no of course it cannot! (Score:3)

    by Budenny ( 888916 ) on Monday January 15, 2024 @11:51AM (#64159917)

    Can Pumping CO2 Into California's Oil Fields Help Stop Global Warming?

    No. Because too little will be removed from the atmosphere as a result to have any effect at all on Global Warming. Or anything else.

    People are always wanting to do things 'because climate' without stating what the effects on the climate will be. In the current case there are about 37 billion tons a year, and rising, of global emissions.

    How much are they going to pump into the oil fields? The answer should be in tons/year.

    As usual, no-one is saying. Tells you all you need to know.

  • Good one. They are going to STOP global warming! Just by pumping some air underground. They will STOP it, I tell you, stop it.

  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    Biochar is the lightweight black residue, made of carbon and ashes, remaining after the pyrolysis of biomass, and is a form of charcoal.[1] Biochar is defined by the International Biochar Initiative as "the solid material obtained from the thermochemical conversion of biomass in an oxygen-limited environment".[2] Biochar is a stable solid that is rich in pyrogenic carbon and can endure in soil for thousands of years.[3]

    You don't "burn" wood, you burn whatever waste wood like

  • No, we don't have enough energy to waste it. Yes, indeed, we are just a part of the thin layer of scum on this planet, and we cannot live without trees.
  • 3, 2, 1â¦
  • We will find out it was a dumb idea and it probably contributed to some other catastrophe.

  • Who would anyone voluntarily pay to do this? Only people who then use it to offset production of CO2 somewhere with the bullshit offset schemes (scams). Then they have effectively pushed the liability into the future. If it breaks then, do they care? Of course not, they've taken advantage of all of the offsets. And likely also have done all of the company manipulation so that there doesn't even exist a company by then that could be held liable.

  • There is lots of unwanted carbon in a solid state: most waste, ag waste, clearing for fire prevention. We let it or encourage it to turn into CO2. I struggle to believe that hoping to bury CO2 is a better option than compacting and storing that solid stuff. Cheaper energy is coming. We don't need to store carbon for long periods. Let's kick the can down the road, not try to solve everything now when we don't have the right energy technology.

    • We could pyrolyze it, and fill old coal mines with it. The cycle could be complete.

      Better to put biochar into agricultural fields, where it will soak up water and fertilizer and sequester carbon for 1000 years. Get rid of waste, improve soil and reduce runoff.

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