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A lot of imagination has gone into the climate change negotiations. The Kyoto Protocol comes immediately to mind. A fine narrative. Within the protocol, CDM. Beats the Surrealist Manifesto by a mile. Within CDM, carbon sinks. Pure, transcendental fiction. But hang on. If you think the protocol’s representation of carbon sinks beggars the imagination, you haven’t understood the human brain at all. Especially the one that dabbles in that goo we call business. Carbon can be storedIn oil-bearing rocks: Injection of carbon dioxide to increase oil recovery is a common practice in many oil fields. Essentially, carbon dioxide is injected under pressure into the oil-bearing rock. While some of it comes back up with the oil, much remains underground, and operations can be modified to ensure that most of the injected carbon dioxide remains underground. Better still, oil companies can earn some credit for the noble task of tucking away carbon dioxide, while earning some oil-rich cash in the process. In the new phase of PanCanadian’s carbon dioxide enhanced oil recovery project in Regina, Canada, around 20 million tonnes of carbon dioxide will be injected into oil reservoirs to observe its potential as an underground sink. In salt bearing rocks: Deep saline formations are another brainwave about innovative carbon dioxide sinks. Salt-bearing rocks and saline aquifers, among all geologic formations, have the largest carbon storage facilities. The US alone, estimates say, could sink as much as 500 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide in this manner. The US is additionally enamoured by the idea, for a number of its large carbon dioxide point sources are near saline formation injection points. The first to actually carry this theory out in action is the Norwegian oil company Statoil, which is planning to inject approximately one million tonnes of carbon dioxide into saline aquifers about a kilometre below its Sleipner offshore platform for the next 20 years. In oceans: Liquefied carbon dioxide is also injected into oceans through pipelines. The Carbon Sequestration Initiative, an international consortium of major industries, is funding Massachusetts Institute of Technology scientists in one of the most extensive projects ever to inject carbon dioxide into the ocean. But did you also know?To start with, there is the usual controversy that surrounds any sequestration project — uncertain storage capacity in the long run. There is also a possibility that the enormous amount of pressure required to compress and inject gas underground will hugely pressure the plug sealing oil shafts. This could cause much of the stored carbon dioxide to leak out. Storage of carbon dioxide underground could bring about a change in sub-surface pressures, resulting in earthquakes. There is the additional risk of groundwater contamination. Such projects could well become a route for industrialised countries to dump their carbon dioxide in Southern territory. In spite of inadequate research on potential long-term impacts, Exxon and Pertamina have been awarded a license by the Indonesian government to explore the large Natuna gas field. Carbon dioxide recovered from this area will be injected into two aquifers at some distance from the gas field. Nearly one million tonnes of carbon dioxide will be injected into the aquifers every day, and the total amount to be injected would be as high as the current annual carbon dioxide emission of the EU. Increased carbon dioxide levels in ocean sequestration causes the ocean to turn acid. This is particularly damaging for deep-sea fish and invertebrates, which have the least ability to adapt to these changes, inhibiting their growth and reproductive capabilities. |
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