Scientists at Columbia University and elsewhere are busy trying to figure out how to inject and securely trap massive amounts of wasted CO2 in the huge geologic formation known as the Newark Basin that sits right underneath New Jersey, including part of the New York metropolitan area. The basin, which began forming 220 million years ago, spans northern New Jersey, southern New York, and southwestern Pennsylvania. Based on (admittedly limited) geological information now available, the U.S. Department of Energy estimates that the potential CO2 storage resources within the Newark Basin is 10 billion metric tons.
At the recent American Geophysical Union annual conference in San Francisco, scientists presented preliminary data from two ongoing research projects trying to determine the feasibility of this project. One, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, is looking at whether regions within the basin are porous and permeable enough to provide a permanent and safe home for CO2. As part of that mission, the project looks for isolated rock layers that could seal off the injected fluids.
Another, funded by the Environmental Protection Agency, also studies rock characteristics, but it mainly assesses how any potential leakage of dissolved CO2 from deep reservoirs might alter rock chemistry and microbial life if it moves up to shallow aquifers.
Natalia Zakharova, a doctoral student in geophysics at Columbia University working with the Borehole Research Group on the EPA-funded project, explained at the AGU conference why the Newark Basin looks so promising. An ideal reservoir for underground CO2 storage, Zakharova says, would be roughly 20 percent "empty," or devoid of solid rock, and it would have solid layers above it that act as a barrier to any potential upward seepage. Sandstone, which is sand that has been cemented together, fits that bill, especially if it has a layer of clay above it. Much of the Newark Basin is sandstone, and parts of the vast area appear to have clay layers as well.
"Geologic [carbon] sequestration is completely viable," Zakharova tells PM. "We can control most of what happens during injection. . . . I?m a little disappointed that there hasn?t been much implementation on a life scale yet, but the idea has appeal."
Zakharova?s team, which is led by Columbia geophysicist David Goldberg, is midway into the three-year study. "If a leakage occurs we need know what effect it will have on shallow aquifers," Zakharova says. "We can usually rely on the fact it [CO2] will stay there. But we want to investigate everything."
The team has drilled a well 1500 feet deep at Columbia?s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory located just north of the New Jersey?New York border. To simulate the effects from potential leakage above storage reservoirs, the Goldberg-Zakharova team injected small amounts of CO2?enriched water into a deep isolated reservoir in the Palisades Sill dolerite and the underlying Newark Basin sediments (see map). They let this solution "incubate" in the reservoir for twenty days, and then pumped it back out and analyzed any biochemical reactions in the host rock and water. Their work shows that some microbe populations shift their distribution patterns initially after leakage, but then, according to Goldberg, they rebound.
The study does not directly address the possible human health effects of drinking water with elevated levels of trace minerals or acidity. But it?s providing crucial information for those hoping to sequester carbon in the Newark Basin: If any heavy metals or other trace minerals of concentrations harmful to people seeped into the drinking water supply, all bets are off.
When carbon dioxide mixes with water, it makes water more acidic, and that more acidic water can release silicate materials such as calcium and magnesium from the rocks. However, rocks rich in such minerals neutralize the acid. A previous study, co-led by Goldberg, at the same site (but a shallower test well) was published in 2007. It showed that calcium and magnesium silicate rocks rapidly neutralized the acidity caused by CO2 injection, at a rate that could allow for "safe and permanent storage of CO2" in certain formations.
While Goldberg's team tries to assess any leak risks, the DOE-funded project in the Newark Basin is making progress in characterizing the suitability of the rocks for carbon injection and permanent storage. The project, called the TriCarb Consortium for Carbon Sequestration, is managed by Sandia Technologies, a Houston firm, and Conrad Geoscience Corp., a consulting firm based in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. Scientists from Columbia University?s Lamont-Doherty are also lending their expertise, and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority is helping to fund the project.
TriCarb is one of several DOE-funded projects across the country that have been investigating the potential for large-scale geologic carbon sequestration. In October, the group completed a drill hole just off the New York State Thruway in Rockland County. They drilled at different depths, ranging from 4900 to about 8600 feet, according to Paul Olsen, a paleontologist at Lamont-Doherty who is working on the TriCarb project. Samples from the rock have not yet been analyzed.
It?s still far from a sure thing that any carbon will be stored in the Newark Basin. For one thing, Olsen and others have been studying the geology since the 1990s, and he says it?s still not clear whether the area is completely suitable?and wouldn?t have any dangerous leaks. For another, many local residents are suspicious of TriCarb, thinking that drilling for carbon sequestration research could be tied to natural gas development, which many people increasingly oppose because of hydraulic fracturing, the controversial drilling practice.
And even if the Newark Basin turns out to be an ideal place to store waste carbon dioxide, any commercial-scale operations would face the same problem that carbon capture and storage projects anywhere would face: the money. Whether such a project is economically feasible depends on power plants (whether natural gas or coal-fired) installing equipment to capture CO2 emissions. That looked more likely years ago; now, though, neither Congress nor the EPA seem inclined to aggressively regulate greenhouse gas emissions. In the absence of such legislation, carbon may remain too cheap to entice power plants to invest in the technology voluntarily.
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