Carbon Capture and Storage Trend
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) projects have been running for a decade in the Oil & Gas industry. But recently Carbon Capture gained a new momentum with growing interest for these projects.
CCS projects main goal is to prevent the release of CO2 and other carbon gases in the atmosphere and participate in climate change. The new interest for these projects is of course fueled by Energy Transition scenarios.
As many applications of Oil & Gas, such as plastic production / power generation, are not yet replaceable by alternatives, the goal is to carry current activities but in a cleaner way. Carbon Capture and Storage has the double advantage to clean existing petroleum related activities, and be an activity look-like to oil & gas.
Carbon Capture and Storage Need
From the graph above, Energy clearly appears as the first source of greenhouse emissions because of its dependency on Oil & Gas products. For many of the listed applications, hydrogen and electrification will come as a substitute in decades. For others, Oil & Gas has no substitute.
By the time the substitution happens and for all the other applications, Carbon Capture and Storage appears as the only possible solution to reduce the carbon footprint. From the list, 7 critical applications concentrate around 47% of the emissions:
- Power Generation
- Gas turbines
- Petrochemical
- Chemicals
- Cement
- Iron & Steel
- Other industries
Consequently, we understand why these applications which are so few but representing so much emissions, have become a clear target and thus project opportunities.
Governments willing to subsidy the cleaning of their economy are the fuel of Carbon Capture projects. In fact, for many governments willing to invest billions in their economy to counter the covid crisis, Carbon Capture comes as the right fit.
Carbon Capture Technologies
The capture of carbon, and mostly CO2, exist in different ways, the main difference being the capture timing. In the picture below we explain the 3 types of capture :
While 3 types of capture exist, today most of the Carbon Capture projects are based on Post Combustion. First, because doing the capture after the combustion prevent to have any effect on the main process. Second, because post combustion carbon capture units can be easily installed during a revamp of existing facilities.
Thus, Post-Combustion is the most developed way of capture and the one with best prospects. Different technologies exist for post combustion capture:
- Amine Absorption
Able to capture up to 85% of the under-pressure CO2
Costly but efficient to transfer the CO2 in a liquid phase, even when concentration is low - Ammonia Absorption
Not fully mature, but CO2 captured at low temperature
In contact with Ammonia, CO2 precipitates into a solid molecule of NH3–CO2–H2O - Membrane Separation
Synthetic membranes filter CO2 from other gases because of their permeability
Passing through series of membranes, flue gases separated by up to 90% of the CO2
Carbon Storage Technologies
Once the carbon captured, the gas is then transported via truck / pipeline / ship to its storage location. The transport of carbon, often CO2, is not a complex issue technology wise, especially for oil & gas operators used to transport hazardous fuels, only we need to build the infrastructure.
We can estimate Capture represents 50% of the investments to build the whole carbon life cycle, Transport benefits from 35% of the investments, while Storage keeps the remaining 15%. This unbalance comes from the the re-utilization of depleted oil and gas fields for carbon storage.
Two injection methods exists for carbon storage. The first one is to inject CO2 in its gaseous format but is only suitable for rock reservoir. The second process is to inject CO2 with brine to maximize volume of storage with high temperature and pressure. This method fits all types of reservoirs:
- Natural Cave
- Former Oil & Gas field
- Coal mines
- Saline Formation
- Saline Aquifer
- Oil field in operation
After the injection, the carbon can deteriorate over a long period of time, participate to Enhanced Oil Recovery Operations (EOR), or recycled later in plastics, fuel, concrete.
Carbon Capture and Storage Map
The current market for carbon capture and storage is mostly dominated by actors of the oil & gas industry because at the sources of the CO2 emissions, as well as owners of most the technologies.
At the opposite of Hydrogen, Carbon Capture and Storage projects are mostly large developments which are looking to scale down costs and benefit from large capacity of storage. From the 60 active projects we trace in www.projectsmartexplorer.com the vast majority are aiming to capture and store more than 1 million tonnes of CO2.
Evidently, the first targets of the joint venture developing CCS projects are the industrial zones in Europe, Middle East, US and Australia where the concentration of CO2 emissions is high and governments are able to subsidy the initiatives.
Carbon Capture and Storage Market
The market for Carbon Capture and Storage is growing at a quick pace. Soon, no CO2 intensive project will be able to be build without its CCS unit. The future prospect of a carbon tax will also be a fuel to launch more and more CCS projects around the globe and reduce global greenhouse emissions.
The CCS market growth is well represented by our extract Capex pipeline from www.projectsmartexplorer.com
In this chart, you can clearly observe the acceleration of today market to develop a brand new sector. To note, if the pipeline is going down after 2025, it is only because the future projects are yet to be announced.
In 2050, we will need to capture and store about 30 billions tonnes of CO2 equivalent per year, driven by new blue hydrogen projects, the revamping of existing infrastructures, a large portion of the carbon captured will be recycled into plastic or energy.
Looking at the figures, carbon capture and storage market will grow from $500 millions capex in 2020 to around $50 billions in 2030 and $100 billions in 2050.
In conclusion, CCS is a market developing, with technology bricks still gaining maturity. For actors of the oil & & gas industry it is the occasion to clean their activities. It is also a great opportunity to transfer know how and take part of a growing market with long-term perspectives.
Are you ready to jump in ? We can help you do it
With our project database www.projectsmartexplorer.com we help companies around the world enter the carbon capture and storage market through data and expertise. Do not hesitate to contact us if you are interested.
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