--> An Overview of the Aquistore Project: Canada's First CO2 Storage Project Associated With a Commercial-Scale Coal-Fired Power Plant

International Conference & Exhibition

Datapages, Inc.Print this page

An Overview of the Aquistore Project: Canada's First CO2 Storage Project Associated With a Commercial-Scale Coal-Fired Power Plant

Abstract

The Aquistore project in southeast Saskatchewan, Canada, is a new research project managed by the Petroleum Technology Research Centre. Aquistore is the CO2 storage component of SaskPower's Boundary Dam Integrated Carbon Capture and Storage (CSS) Demonstration Project – the world's first commercial-scale, post-combustion CCS project from a coal-fired electrical generation station. Aquistore will provide both a research component for CCS along with a secure storage alternative and buffer protection option for the CO2-EOR client during operational interruptions to avoid venting CO2 to the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide captured at the power station will be pipelined 2.8km to the Aquistore injection site. There, in 2015, up to 1000 tonnes CO2/day will be injected into a recently drilled 3400m deep injection well. Injection horizons are ~150m thick permeable sandstones belonging to the Winnipeg and Deadwood formations that sit >3000m deep above crystalline Precambrian rocks at the base of the Phanerozoic section. Multiple, thick, continuous sealing layers overlie the injection zone. Research on the Aquistore site began in 2009, with the initiation of a geological characterization program that expanded to a full geophysical, petrophysical, hydrogeological, and geochemical characterization using both pre-existing and newly-acquired data at, and around, the site. Data were used for: site selection; permitting; scientific and risk assessment studies; and for baseline measurements leading to the development of a comprehensive Measurement, Monitoring, and Verification (MMV) plan. Some unique features of the Aquistore MMV plan include: a newly-drilled 3400m deep instrumented observation well situated 150m from the injection well; a 650 geophone permanent seismic array installed 20m deep on a 2.5×2.5km regular grid; two years of time-lapse surface baseline surveys including groundwater, soil gas, atmospheric, InSAR, GPS, tiltmeters, gravity, electromagnetic, and microseimic monitoring; downhole fibre-optic distributed acoustic sensing and distributed temperature sensing lines; and a novel 3350m deep fluid recovery system in the observation well, among others. The ultimate goal of the Aquistore Project is to quantify stored CO2 in the subsurface. Aquistore will serve as a rigorous trial and demonstration of effective surface and downhole technologies for monitoring CO2 and provide evidence that CCS is safe and effective way to reduce emissions.