Title: Don’t Spill and Kill: Fill and Drill - Greentech Media

Industry sector: Clean Coal

Don’t Spill and Kill: Fill and Drill
GreatPoint CFO explains how carbon dioxide can enhance oil recovery onshore.

Daniel Goldman, GreatPoint Energy EVP & CFO: May 25, 2010
Greentech Media

Calls for "drill, baby, drill" have been muted recently. Americans of all political persuasions are outraged by the BP Deepwater Horizon gusher (it's not a spill that can just be stopped and wiped up) in the Gulf of Mexico. This as-yet-uncontained catastrophe highlights the significant risks inherent in deep-water, offshore drilling near our coastlines. The tragic loss of human life, as well as the environmental and economic impacts, are enormous. Irreparable damage has been caused to the Gulf of Mexico tourist industry, which is estimated by the Environmental Protection Agency at $20 billion, and to Gulf Coast commercial and recreational fishing, with the direct cost already estimated at over $6 billion. The lasting impact and actual cost likely will not be known for years to come. Following the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989 and this recent tragedy, we cannot, and need not, take this risk anymore.

Everyone agrees that reducing oil imports enhances our national security. To do so, we can produce more domestic oil from onshore sources and at the same time capture and store our carbon dioxide (CO2) in the oil reservoirs, greatly reducing emissions of this global-warming pollutant. America has ample supplies of oil onshore, but these stranded reserves are trapped in pockets that need to be pressurized to lift the oil economically -- a process called "enhanced oil recovery," or EOR. EOR enables the production of "stranded" oil by injecting CO2 to restore the pressure. The CO2 gets sequestered in the reservoir under the cap rock and is measured and monitored to ensure there is no leakage.

There are currently 105 existing EOR projects producing over 240,000 barrels per day, and ironically, the supply of CO2 is from naturally occurring drilled sources rather than man-made emissions. Oil producers currently pay for this CO2, and they will pay for CO2 captured from power plants and industrial facilities, as well. EOR production could be increased dramatically if CO2 were made available through capture from existing coal-fired power plants and industrial facilities...

Read the full article at Greentech Media.