Test Under Way to Address Climate Change
February 21 2008 - 2:30PM
PR Newswire (US)
CHARLTON TOWNSHIP, Mich., Feb. 21 /PRNewswire/ -- A research team
that includes partners from industry, academia and government has
begun a test of injecting high pressure carbon dioxide into a deep
saline geologic formation more that 3,000 feet underground, 11
miles east of the City of Gaylord. The experiment, part of the U.S.
Department of Energy's Midwest Regional Carbon Sequestration
Partnership (MRCSP) Phase II Project, is designed to provide better
understanding of the potential for deep-underground storage (called
geologic sequestration) as a means to prevent carbon dioxide from
being emitted to the atmosphere, where it is believed to contribute
to climate change. "This sequestration field test by our Midwest
partnership region serves as one of many ongoing nationwide tests
to demonstrate the feasibility of permanently storing greenhouse
gases," said Jim Slutz, Acting Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary
for Fossil Energy. "The success of each of these tests moves the
nation's carbon sequestration program another step closer to
determining the processes best suited to address the overall issue
of global warming." MRCSP began injecting the carbon dioxide in
early February and expects to complete the injection of 10,000 tons
by the end of March, 2008. The carbon dioxide is being captured
from a DTE Energy natural gas processing plant about eight miles
from injection site. The pressurized, high-density carbon dioxide
is transported to the injection well through an existing pipeline.
After injection is complete, scientists will conduct tests to
determine how the carbon dioxide responds to being contained within
the targeted geologic formations. The results of those tests are
expected to be available in later in 2008. The MRCSP, one of seven
DOE-sponsored regional partnerships, is led by Battelle, a
non-profit global leader in technology development and
commercialization. The MRCSP includes a 30-plus member team of
state and federal officials, leading universities, state geological
surveys, non-governmental organizations, and private companies in
the eight-state region of Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan,
New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. Partners involved
in the Michigan Basin test, in addition to Battelle and the site
operator, Core Energy LLC, include DTE Energy, the Michigan
Geological Repository for Research and Education at Western
Michigan University, and the Michigan Department of Environmental
Quality (MDEQ), Office of Geological Survey. David Ball, Battelle's
project manager for MRCSP, said this carbon dioxide sequestration
field test draws on several advantages of this site, including the
infrastructure for supplying and transporting carbon dioxide due to
DTE Energy and Core Energy commercial operations there along with
suitable geologic formations for storage of carbon dioxide in the
area. "Although the test is very small in scale, it holds great
promise as an important step in building our knowledge and helping
future generations to address global warming," Ball said.
Geoscientists at the Michigan Geological Repository for Research
and Education at Western Michigan University have concluded from
their research carried out for MRCSP that formations throughout the
state may contain enough capacity to store hundreds of years' worth
of current emission levels from large point sources of carbon
dioxide in the state. Ball points out that the ability to inject
carbon dioxide into deep geological formations is only part of the
solution. "For geologic sequestration to be successful, we will
need to develop reliable, efficient and economical technologies to
separate or, in other words, capture carbon dioxide from large
fossil fuel fired processes like those at power plants, steel
mills, cement plants and other industrial operations," he said.
"Research is progressing in that area, but economical capture
technology is not ready for commercial application today." Ball
added that addressing climate change will require multiple
technologies in addition to geologic sequestration. He said some of
those include increases in use of renewable energy, increased
energy conservation and energy conversion efficiency, and increases
in carbon sequestration through terrestrial methods, where carbon
dioxide is removed from the atmosphere by plants and converted to
carbon in the soil and root matter. DATASOURCE: DTE Energy CONTACT:
John Austerberry of DTE Energy, +1-313-235-8859; or T.R. Massey,
+1-614-424-5544, or Katy Delaney, +1-410-306-8638, both of Battelle
Web site: http://www.dteenergy.com/
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