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Saline Aquifers
Saline Aquifers
A R T I C L E I N F O
A B S T R A C T
Article history:
Received 8 July 2009
Received in revised form 18 December 2009
Accepted 31 December 2009
Available online 25 January 2010
The experience from CO2 injection at pilot projects (Frio, Ketzin, Nagaoka, US Regional Partnerships) and
existing commercial operations (Sleipner, Snhvit, In Salah, acid-gas injection) demonstrates that CO2
geological storage in saline aquifers is technologically feasible. Monitoring and verication technologies
have been tested and demonstrated to detect and track the CO2 plume in different subsurface geological
environments. By the end of 2008, approximately 20 Mt of CO2 had been successfully injected into saline
aquifers by existing operations. Currently, the highest injection rate and total storage volume for a single
storage operation are approximately 1 Mt CO2/year and 25 Mt, respectively. If carbon capture and
storage (CCS) is to be an effective option for decreasing greenhouse gas emissions, commercial-scale
storage operations will require orders of magnitude larger storage capacity than accessed by the existing
sites. As a result, new demonstration projects will need to develop and test injection strategies that
consider multiple injection wells and the optimisation of the usage of storage space. To accelerate largescale CCS deployment, demonstration projects should be selected that can be readily employed for
commercial use; i.e. projects that fully integrate the capture, transport and storage processes at an
industrial emissions source.
2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
CO2 geological storage
Saline aquifers
Demonstration projects
* Corresponding author at: CO2CRC, CSIRO Earth Science & Resource Engineering,
Australian Resources Research Centre, 26 Dick Perry Avenue, Kensington, WA 6151,
Australia. Tel.: +61 8 6436 8759; fax: +61 8 6436 8555.
E-mail address: karsten.michael@csiro.au (K. Michael).
1. Introduction
1750-5836/$ see front matter 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijggc.2009.12.011
660
Fig. 1. Map showing projects injecting or having injected CO2 into deep saline aquifers. Also shown are projects in an advanced planning stage (see text for details) as well as
the Weyburn (EOR), Otway and K12B (depleted gas reservoirs) pilot projects. Otway Phase 2, starting in 2010, will include small-scale injection into a saline aquifer.
offshore Norway (Maldal and Tappel, 2004), both injecting CO2 from
natural gas production, commenced operations in 2004 and 2008,
respectively. Various commercial projects are planned for the future,
with Gorgon in Australia, another natural gas facility approved in
2009, anticipated to start injecting in 2014, potentially becoming the
largest CO2 storage operation in the world (Chevron, 2005; Malek,
2009). Pilot injection operations for research purposes were run in
Nagaoka (Japan) (Kikuta et al., 2005) and Frio (USA) (Hovorka et al.,
2006) between 2003 and 2005. New pilot operations in Ketzin
(Germany) (Forster et al., 2006) and selected projects in the US DOE
Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership (RCSP) program started
injection in 2008, with more projects in the RCSP planning to
commence operations in 2009 (www.fossil.energy.gov/sequestration/partnerships/index.html). Also in 2008, the Otway project
(Australia) in Phase I started CO2 injection into a depleted gas
reservoir (Sharma et al., 2009). Otway Phase II will include injection
into an overlying saline aquifer early in 2010.
Details of aforementioned operations, publically available in
the literature and on company as well as government websites,
were compiled in a database and a selection is summarised in
Table 2 and Appendix A. It should be noted that due to
condentiality issues and rapid changes in the CCS political
environment, the availability of data for some injection operations
may be limited or not up-to-date. Also, in the current political and
economic environment, a multitude of CO2 injection projects are
proposed and are in various planning stages, but it is difcult to
determine the likelihood of the actual implementation of specic
projects. For example, projects that appeared to have a high
probability of going ahead and had numerous associated research
activities, e.g., FutureGen (Mattoon), or Schweinrich (CO2STORE/
Europe) were cancelled or put on hold due to the re-allocation or
vanishing of funding or change in site operators. As of June 2009,
Table 1
Denition of scale for operations injecting CO2 into saline aquifers.
Scale
Purpose
Injection rate
Life time
Example
Pilot
Demonstration
10 kt/year
1 Mt/year
>1 Mt/year
>10 years
Commercial
a
661
Fig. 2. Past and planned future implementation of CO2 geological storage in saline aquifers. The timing of planned projects, particularly commercial operations, has a large
degree of uncertainty and refers to the respective project start, whereas the start of CO2 injection could be several years later.
Table 2
List of operations injecting or having injected CO2 in saline aquifers, as of December 2009. Some projects in an advanced planning stage are also shown and the list continues
to grow.
Project name
Location
Scale
Status
Inj. start
Inj. nish
Frio
Pilot
Completed
Pilot
Pilot
Frio 1 2004
Frio 2 2006
2005
2010
Snhvit
Commercial
Sleipner
Commercial
In Salah
Krechba, Algeria
Commercial
Gorgon
Commercial
MGSC Decatur
MRCSP Appalachian Basin
MRCSP - Cincinnati Arch
Completed
Injection
underway
Injection
underway
Injection
underway
Injection
underway
Injection
underway
Approved
Frio 1 2004
Frio 2 2006
2003
2008
Liberty County,
Texas, USA
Nagaoka City, Japan
Ketzin, Brandenburg,
Germany
Alberta & B.C., Canada
Pilot
SECARB Mississippi
SECARB Early
Pilot
Demonstration
WESTCARB
Rosetta-Calpine Saline
WESTCARB Arizona Utilities
Pilot
Work underway
No injectivity
Monitoring
underway
Monitoring
underway
Completed
Injection
underway
Cancelled
Pilot
No injectivity
Nagaoka
Ketzin
Commercial
Demonstration
Pilot
Pilot
Inj. rate
(t/day)
250
40
86
Total
storage (kt)
1.6
10
60
1990
5190
2008
2000
23,000
1996
2700
20,000
2004
3500
17,000
2014
12,300
129,000
2010
2008
2009
2012
2009
2009
1000
500
1000
2008
2009
300600
60
2008
2009
2008
2010
160
2700
2009
2009
2009
2009
2.75
1500
2
662
Fig. 3. Selected characteristics of CO2 geological storage operations in saline aquifers. The timing of planned projects, particularly commercial operations, has a large degree of
uncertainty and refers to the respective project start, whereas the start of CO2 injection could be several years later.
663
664
4. Conclusions
The experience from CO2 injection at pilot projects (Frio,
Ketzin, Nagaoka, US Regional Partnerships) and existing
commercial operations (Sleipner, Snhvit, In Salah, acid-gas
injection) shows that CO2 geological storage in saline aquifers
is technologically feasible. These operations have been
extremely helpful for testing monitoring and verication
technology and have been used to establish best practise
guidelines (Chadwick et al., 2007; CO2CRC, 2008; Cooper, 2009;
WRI, 2008) for future CO2 geological storage sites. However,
some issues remain:
Pilot sites generally have a comprehensive monitoring program,
but injection rates/volumes are low compared to potential
commercial projects;
Existing commercial projects inject considerable volumes of CO2,
however monitoring programs are often limited (i.e., In Salah) or
reservoir properties are unrepresentatively good (i.e., relatively high permeability at Sleipner);
Relative permeability and residual saturation of CO2 at the
reservoir scale, essential parameters for capacity estimates and
migration modelling, need to be better constrained by appropriate testing and interpreting data from pilot and commercial
storage projects;
There is limited data from post-injection monitoring, which is
needed for storage validation, model calibration, and long-term
assessment of monitoring strategies;
Only a few projects demonstrated that existing monitoring
techniques could detect but, so far, not quantify potential CO2
migration outside the storage container; and
Shale
620
110
110
150
150
Shale
Shale
Shale
Sandstone
Martin Formation
SECARB Mississippi
SECARB Early
WESTCARB Rosetta-Calpine
Saline
WESTCARB Arizona Utilities
Sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone
15
No injectivity
1081
200
150,000
200,000
64
2595
3140
1052
1180
501000
7000
120,000
300
20
100
22
35,000
23,750340,000
15343
60
250
29
9502814
2550
1000
1850
2300
1980
2170
1000
1061
1413
450
5000
5
25
225
0.0010.08
10200
22
426
13
37
17
20
15
3.2
12
13
Various
Sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone
Dolomite
Various
Tubasen Formation
Utsira Formation
Krechba Formation
Dupuy Formation
Mt. Simon Sandstone
Clinton Sandstone
Mt. Simon Sandstone
Bass Islands Dolomite/
Bois Blanc
L. Tuscaloosa Formation
L. Tuscaloosa Formation
McCormick Sand
Alberta Basin (Acid Gas)
Snhvit
Sleipner
In Salah
Gorgon
MGSC Decatur
MRCSP Appalachian Basin
MRCSP - Cincinnati Arch
MRCSP Michigan Basin
23
21
20
37
90
100
71
30.5
28
600027,000
28,500
10,300
17,900
22,000
15,000
26,500
9720
10,170
26103
15218
30
75
950
250
100
70
1500
76
56
46
34
78
133
210
Shale
Mudstone
Mudstone
w/dolomite
Various
Shale
Shale
Mudstone
Shale
Shale
Limestone
Shale
Limestone
92,633
7113
250,000
24
60
80
1546
1100
650
1500
6
750
Sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone
Upper Frio C
Haizume Formation
Stuttgart Fm.
Frio
Nagaoka
Ketzin
30
Temperature
(8C)
Thickness
(m)
Seal lithology
Salinity (mg/l)
Thickness
(m)
Depth
(m)
Permeability
(mD)
Porosity
(%)
Lithology
Aquifer unit
665
Project name
Acknowledgements
Pressure
(kPa)
15,200
11,900
7300
666
Monitoring methods
Selected references
Sleipner
1. Time-lapse seismic
2. Time-lapse gravity
3. Micro-seismic
Audigane et al. (2007), Arts et al. (2004a,b, 2008), Arts and Winthaegen (2005),
Chadwick et al. (2005), Ghaderi and Landro (2005), Nooner et al. (2007),
Torp and Gale (2004), Zweigel et al. (1999, 2004)
Frio
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Well logging
Geochemical samplings
Cross-well seismic
Vertical seismic proling
Cross-well electro-magnetic surveys
Tracer injection
Pressure and temperature measurements
Soil-gas measurements
Daley et al. (2006, 2008), Doughty et al. (2008), Freifeld et al. (2005),
Hovorka and Knox (2003), Hovorka et al. (2006), Kharaka et al. (2006a,b),
and Muller et al. (2007)
Nagaoka
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Kikuta et al. (2005), Mito et al. (2006, 2008), Onishi et al. (2009),
Saito et al. (2006), Xue et al. (2006, 2009), and Zwingmann et al. (2005)
Ketzin
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Time-lapse seismic
Cross-hole electrical resistivity
Temperature and pressure proling
Time-lapse vertical seismic proling
Time-lapse moving-source seismic proling
Microbiology
In Salah
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Mathieson et al. (2009), Onuma and Ohkawa (2009), Riddiford et al. (2003, 2005),
and Rutqvist et al. (2009)
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