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South Arkansas possible location for carbon dioxide storage Friday, Feb 1, 2008 By Aaron Sadler Stephens Washington Bureau WASHINGTON - The state's top oil and gas regulator identified southern Arkansas on Thursday as a possible location where massive carbon dioxide reserves might someday be stored underground to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Arkansas Oil and Gas Commission Director Lawrence Bengal said the geology of the region "has potential" to play a role for power plants that will practice carbon sequestration. There is no commercial carbon dioxide storage currently in the United States, Bengal said. The cost to remove the gas from power plant emissions, transport it and store it is the biggest obstacle. But the government has shown growing interest in technology to curb carbon dioxide emissions blamed for global warming. Once sequestered, one method to keep the gas out of the atmosphere is to store it in underground reservoirs, in geological formations like depleted oil fields and coal seams. "Arkansas has potential, I don't think as an immediate storage capacity because we haven't categorized our sites that succinctly yet," said Bengal of Little Rock. "It does have the geology necessary for it in south Arkansas. There very well could be some future (carbon dioxide) storage in that part of the state." Two bills in Congress would spur research into methods to extract carbon dioxide from power plant emissions. Because the process is expensive, it may be years, if at all, before Arkansas sites are used for carbon dioxide storage. If they are, a researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology said there are little to no environmental concerns. "I think the biggest thing people worry about is leaks and what it would do to health," said Howard Herzog, MIT's principal research for carbon capture and sequestration technologies. "If it leaks out into things with good circulation, you're not even going to know it's there," Herzog said. "I don't think it's a major concern with this whole thing. I think cost is the biggest barrier." Without a government push to force carbon sequestration, the process is slow-going, Bengal said. "To retrofit an existing plant is very costly, and obviously, until the regulatory mandate to do so, the technology isn't moving as fast as if there were one," he said. Bengal was on Capitol Hill to testify before a Senate committee about regulation of carbon dioxide removal. He urged Congress to let the states regulate the storage process. He said existing Environmental Protection Agency rules should be enough on a federal level. States should be responsible for licensing storage sites, dealing with property rights issues and monitoring sites long-term, he said. "As we look at ways to mitigate global climate change, it is important to examine the role carbon capture and storage can play," said Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark. "Mr. Bengal's work developing a regulatory structure for this emerging technology will go a long way toward the acceptance and use of carbon capture and storage." Lincoln is on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, which heard Bengal's testimony. As another option besides storing the gas, researchers are looking at ways to reuse carbon dioxide to enhance oil and natural gas recovery. At its power plant at Shady Point, Okla., AES captures 200 tons of carbon dioxide per day. The liquefied gas is then sold to the food products industry, according to the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. Bengal heads a task force of the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission. That group offered lawmakers its recommendations Thursday. |
