Introduction to CCS

Carbon Capture and Storage

The CCS technology means that carbon dioxide emitted from large power plants, steel mills, and chemical plants is separated and collected to be reused or saved in geological structure and biological uptake (such as algae). Such technology can prevent carbon dioxide from being emitted to the air. It reduces carbon emission from power plants by about 85%-90%. The technology can be divided into capture, transportation, and storage.

In 2005, IPCC set up “Special Report on Carbon Capture and Storage (SRCCS)”. The report indicated the method of CCS and its importance to reduction of greenhouse gas. The principle of CCS is that CO2 stored deeply in the high-pressure formations about 800 meter in depth becomes “fluid” under the high-density supercritical state. Such CO2 is injected into the reservoir beds where a great amount of open pores interconnect with each other. Fluids flow among them and are stored in the inter-space. Geological storage refers to CO2 stored in the formations stably for more than a thousand year. It is currently considered the quite potential mechanism for CO2 reduction in the world.

According to Technology Roadmap Carbon capture and storage proposed by International Energy Agency (IEA) in 2013, the goal to reduce the emission of greenhouse gas to half of that in 2009 should be achieved through technologies of greenhouse gas reduction, such as development of renewable energy, improvement in energy efficiency, and carbon capture storage (CCS). Among these technologies, CCS accounts for 14% of the total reduction. Since CCS is the important option for emission reduction, it should be included as one of important technologies to fight against global warming.

According to the forecast in Key World Energy Statistics 2005 conducted by IEA in 2005, the global use rate of renewable energy in 2030 was still the same as that in 2003. In the period, the growth rate of supply of renewable energy was the same as that of supply of total energy; that is, an increase by 56.4%. As a result, it is estimated that fossil fuels will remain the main source of energy supply in next 50 or 100 years. In this case, the importance of application of CCS is highlighted.