Final project: outline

Julian Quiroz, Martin Montes, and Isaac Esquivel

San Francisco de Quito University

Climate Change and Society NRC: 3587

Inst. María Mateus Cordovez

September, Sunday 10th, 2023

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I. Introduction

a. Hook:

- Can you imagine living in a world where pollution is no longer a life-threatening problem for
humans? On the contrary, that factories, vehicles and industrial products allow us to manage
C02 and convert it into a food source for species in the sea or simply move it away from our
environment to avoid damage to the climate system, all this is possible, and science is achieving
it through technological advances that allow the capture and storage of carbon.

b. Background information:

- Living in a planet that is facing such a big environmental problem as climate change, there is
a need to combat the constant emission of carbon that directly affects the atmosphere using
vehicles, deforestation, agriculture, resource extraction or chemical processes, but considering
these activities as fundamental actions for the proper economic, technological, and social
development of human beings, we can continue practicing them but through the capture and
storage of carbon.

- It is a technology based on the collection of this compound through the reduction of emissions
in the atmosphere, thus contributing to combat climate change. It consists of three main stages:
capture (collection of CO2s); transport (mobilization of the compound) and storage (injection
of CO2 in saline aquifers, gas fields or at the bottom of the sea).

c. Thesis statement:

- Main Argument: In this writing, we will focus on directly exploring the technique of carbon
capture and storage using new technologies that allow us to know this process with an
innovative approach, in addition to the level of effectiveness it represents in the fight against
climate change.

- We will analyze the benefits and challenges of this practice when it is applied.

- As a technology, we will evaluate the global expansion capacity it may have and the
economic, social, and technological impact it may represent.

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- As a small technology, which currently stores only 40 million tons of CO2 per year, in contrast
to the 34 billion tons from fuels by 2020, we will analyze the guarantees of expansion that it
can have and how to expand its use and scope.

- Research question: What are the technological, technical, economic, and social difficulties
that do not allow the correct expansion of this technology on a large scale and how can we
solve them?

II. Literature Review or Background Information

• Transportation: “Carbon transport and storage infrastructure is the backbone of the

carbon management industry. Proposed carbon transport and storage capacities have
increased dramatically over the past year, with more than 370 million tonnes of carbon
storage capacity per year announced in January 2022, with equivalent capacity to
connect infrastructure. Based on the existing project, CO2 storage capacity could
increase to more than 420 million CO2 storage units per year by 2030, when the balance
between CO2 storage supply and planned demand based on 2030 storage capacity
globally will equalize. This is a positive outlook for the CCUS industry, indicating a
strengthened market situation, mainly due to policy implementation and coordinated
alignment of the CCUS value chain by operators. However, this is not enough to meet
the net zero demand of approximately 1,200 Mt CO2/year by 2030”(Carl
greenfield,2022).
• Capture: Currently, we have one of the problems that have put many countries around
the world on alert, namely CO2 emissions. Humanity itself has been responsible for the
absurd emission of CO2, so this problem can be fatal for the whole world now and
especially in the future.
• Storage: “The first experience began in 1996, when one million tons of carbon dioxide
was injected annually into the deep water. That is the first industrial task in the
geological storage of CO2 from an environmental point of view - to fight against
climate change. The carbon dioxide comes from the Sleipner natural gas field, which
is located in the North Sea approximately 200 kilometers from the Norwegian coast and
has been under the control of Statoil since 1996. Made mainly of methane, natural gas
also contains 4-10% carbon dioxide, which must be reduced to 2.5 % to meet business

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 standards. This reduction procedure takes place abroad. The extracted carbon dioxide
gas is pumped directly into the largest local salt water body, approximately 1,000
meters below the seabed, the Utsira sand formation. Every year, a million tons of
carbon dioxide are buried in the ocean floor, instead of being released into the
atmosphere as usual. The injection fees are offset by the Norwegian foreign emission
tax. Title: The world's first storage of carbon dioxide in deep saline groundwater in
Sleipner, North Sea (Norway). Natural gas is taken from a drilling platform at a depth
of 2,500 meters and separated from the CO2 contained in it on a gas processing
platform. The CO2 is then injected into the sand aquifer of Utsira, 1 000m
deep.(Florence janaud 2021).

III. Results (if applicable)

Presentation of findings
• Description of the analyzed data (Author, Year).

In this, we can analyze that in the technology of carbon capture, the CO2 is released by heating
to form a high purity CO2 stream, and capacity have more than 370 Mt CO2 of new annual
storage since January 2022, and the natural gas, mainly made of methane, also contains 4 to
10% of CO2, a rate that must be cut down to 2.5% in order to respect the trade standards it
represents in the fight against climate change.

• Presentation of relevant statistics or visual aids (Author, Year)

Energy that is produced by carbon is low than fuel or other energies for this is
importance the energy of capture carbon

(Bagluy,2023)

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IV. Discussion
• - The carbon capture and storage technology present problems such as the high cost of
operational management, therefore we propose to analyze if there are ways to minimize
the cost in terms of its level of application. “The future costs of CO2 capture and storage
could decline as technology advances and once they are used on a large scale, perhaps
by 20-30% over the next decade. However, the rising price of fossil fuels could increase
their costs. As biomass plants are currently small, the costs for CO2 capture and storage
should be relatively high” (Greenfacts, 2023).
• - The use of different sites for the correct carbon storage is complex because most of
the saline aquifers, certain points of the ocean, among others, must meet the necessary
conditions to apply the correct carbon storage and avoid leakage. Although injection
underground is considered the best option as "A study led by the Spanish National
Research Council (CSIC) shows that injecting billions of tons of atmospheric CO2
(carbon dioxide) underground has a low risk of surface leakage” (Arroyo, 2023).
• - The technological sources currently do not allow to use 100% of the mechanisms that
allow to capture the CO2 emitted by means of transport such as cars, airplanes, among
others, this represents a major problem for the application of this technology, since not
all emissions will be able to be covered and for this reason the total and immediate
operation is somewhat uncertain.
• - CO2 leaks may occur over time because the places where this compound would be
stored require constant control of the various surfaces for this reason at the time of not
fully take care of the site the result would be catastrophic for the environment by the
possible accumulation of carbon dioxide. It is for this reason that "to calculate the risk
of CO2 leakage, the researchers predicted the gas flow at the surface after injection at
1,550 meters depth (the usual depth for storing gas underground), using numerical
transport models in two different scenarios” (Arroyo, 2023).

V. Conclusion
At this point this part is tentative and/or could be set as a hypothesis and may be subject to
change once you begin to develop your final report.
a. Restatement of the thesis or research question
The focus of this writing is to delve into carbon capture and storage (CSS) as a technology to
mitigate climate change
b. Summary of the main points discussed in the paper
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CCS enables us to capture Co2 from processes and securely store it underground. While it has
the potential to significantly reduce emissions currently only a small fraction Co2 of emissions
are being stored.
The advantages of CCS include its ability to decrease emissions from fossil fuel usage and act
as a pathway towards achieving a zero-carbon economy.
However, we must address challenges such as costs, technological limitations and uncertainty
surrounding long-term storage
c. Final remarks on the implications and significance of the research
The implications and significance of CCS largely depend on our ability to scale it up in a
manner that aligns with considerations.
Achieving deployment may necessitate policy incentives and advancements in technology
d. Call to action or suggestions for future application or research
We must prioritize research in improving CCS technology reducing costs evaluating storage
capacity monitoring sites effectively and integrating CCS into a climate strategy.
“Achieving adoption will require acceptance, alongside appropriate legal and regulatory
frameworks” (Oreskes, 2004).

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 References

Arroyo, I. (2023). Almacenar CO2 bajo tierra podría ser una solución segura para mitigar el
cambio climático, según un estudio del CSIC. Química.
https://www.interempresas.net/Quimica/Articulos/466414-Almacenar-CO2-bajo-tierra-
podria-ser-solucion-segura-mitigar-cambio-climatico-segun.html

Delpart, F. (2021). Deep saline Aquifers. https://www.club-co2.fr/en/content/deep-saline-

aquifers
Field, C.B.,(2014) et al., Section A-3. The Decision-making Context, in: Technical summary
https://es.w.org/wiki/Wayback_Machine
Greenfacts. (2023). Captura y almacenamiento de CO2: ¿Cuál es la rentabilidad de las distintas
opciones de captura y almacenamiento de CO2?.
https://www.greenfacts.org/es/captura-almacenamiento-co2/l-2/8-coste-captura-
almacenamiento.htm
Greenfield, C. (2022), CO2 transportation and storage. https://www.iea.org/energy-
system/carbon-capture-utilisation-and-storage/co2-transport-and-storage

Oreskes, Naomi (2004), «Beyond the ivory tower. The scientific consensus on climate
change»https://archive.org/details/climatechange2000000unse

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Siegenthaler, U.; Sarmiento, J. L. (1993), «Atmospheric carbon dioxide and the ocean.
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Stern, Nicholas (2008), «The economics of climate change.

https://web.archive.org/web/20110919170007/http://www.bioenergy-
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