CSIRO’s CO2 Utilisation Roadmap is an important document detailing Australia’s opportunities to convert carbon dioxide to useful products.
“The opportunities identified in CSIRO’s CO2 Utilisation Roadmap highlight prospective avenues for Australia to capitalise on CCU technologies. Research and demonstration remain fundamental to creating a clear pathway to commercial deployment and deep decarbonization at scale.” said Dr Matthias Raab, Chief Executive of CO2CRC.
“CO2CRC has an active research and demonstration portfolio in areas of CO2 utilisation, including direct air capture (DAC), Carbon Negative Hydrogen Utilisation Hub (CNHUB), and CO2 enhanced oil recovery (CO2-EOR).”
“Direct Air Capture technologies are maturing rapidly around the world and field deployment is required to prototype at scale. CO2CRC’s Otway International Test Centre is equipped and ready to test and demonstrate DAC units with the captured CO2 able to be stored underground. This is yet another unique advantage for Australia to innovate, demonstrate and verify the viability of a highly prospective technology. And, we can do it faster than anywhere else in the world.”
“CO2CRC’s Carbon Negative Hydrogen Utilisation research integrates all forms of hydrogen production, storage, and CO2 utilisation in a single centre to demonstrate a complete supply chain solution for a hydrogen and carbon negative economy, where CO2 is either sequestered or converted into renewable biochemicals, biopolymers and biofuels.”
“CO₂-EOR has the potential to significantly reduce CO₂ emissions while improving Australia’s energy security by boosting oil recovery in mature basins. All of the injected volume of CO₂ will be permanently stored in underground reservoirs by the end of the operational life cycle.”
“GA and CO2CRC have recently concluded a basin screening study for CO2 EOR in Australia which shows significant opportunities for permanent CO2 storage and enhanced oil recovery in the Cooper, Surat, Gippsland, Bonaparte, and Carnarvon basins. The study shows, by optimising the CO2 storage during the EOR project, these basins can store up to 2.5 Gt of CO2, making it even a net-negative emissions process.” he said.
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For more information please contact:
Roy Anderson, CO2CRC Strategic Partnerships Manager on 03 8595 9600 or roy.anderson@co2crc.com.au
Notes:
Direct Air Capture (DAC)
Direct air capture is a technology to capture CO2 from the atmosphere. The CO2 can be permanently stored in deep geological formations or used in the production of fuels, chemicals, building materials and other products containing CO2.
DAC is the most suitable technology to reduce emissions from distributed emission sources like the transport sector which is Australia’s third largest source of greenhouse gas emissions (96 Mt CO2-e per year) and aviation sector that emits around 9.99 Mt of CO2-e per year. Without DAC, combined with carbon storage, the target of net zero emission is hard to achieve.
CO2CRC’s Otway International Test Centre (OITC) is one of the most advanced field scale CCUS research sites globally with a state-of-the-art infrastructure and facilities for CO2 capture, CO2 sequestration, monitoring and validation. The OITC is dedicated to delivering innovative research, products and services designed to improve the cost-effectiveness and demonstrate the environmental integrity of CCUS technologies and methodologies.
The OITC provides the required infrastructure for the field testing of DAC technology providers. The OITC has seven purpose-drilled wells for permanently monitoring the stored CO2. The OITC has maintained an operational safety record of zero lost time injury for more than 14 years making it ideally suited for DAC technology demonstration and development with geological storage.
Carbon Negative Hydrogen Utilisation Hub (CNHUB)
CO2CRC has recently completed a techno-economic study identifying renewable carbon negative methanol production along with co-product of precursor chemicals for polymers. This technological route based on novel integration of commercial technologies is aimed to be demonstrated at CO2CRC’s proposed Carbon Negative Hydrogen Utilisation Hub (CNHUB). This hub, in addition to demonstrating the carbon negative methanol and polymers would also demonstrate CO2 based polymer and chemical production using biological conversion in bioreactors.
CO2 EOR
CO2 EOR is a proven permanent CO2 storage technology that can economically reduce the industrial CO2 emission at a large scale while extending the life of the current oil and condensate assets. Although CO2-EOR has been used successfully for decades (Approximately 64 Mt of CO₂ per year is used for EOR in the United States alone), it has not gained traction in Australia to date, despite the significant volume of stranded hydrocarbon assets, mainly due to the age of the assets.
There is interest in exploring the potential for CO2-EOR in Australia given some of the oil and condensate assets are reaching the end of their natural production life. GA and CO2CRC have completed a basin screening study which shows significant potential for permanent CO2 storage during EOR in Australia. The results of the study will be published shortly. A more detailed study is in progress by CO2CRC and NERA which is investigating the viability of CO2 EOR in the Cooper and Surat basins to estimate the potential of the key fields in these basins for permanent CO2 storage during EOR and their associated economics. The preliminary results show that CO2 EOR is technically feasible in more than 100 reservoirs in these basins. The results of this study will be ready by the end of 2021.