Outline

　Carbon dioxide Capture and Storage (CCS) is attracting an attention as a realistic solution to climate change probably caused by a rapid increase of greenhouse gas emission and Geological storage of CO2 is a key technology in the process of CCS. In March 2008, we published a technical report reviewing our studies on the CCS technology development concerning to CO2 storage in saline aquifer.

Details

　CCS in many countries has been proposing to inject and storage CO2 into depleted oil and gas fields. In Japan, however, there is limited storage potential in such fields due to different geological setting. CO2 storage in open saline aquifers at a depth over 1,000m is considered to be an alternative option in the implementation of CCS in Japan. The technical report overviews our studies essential to the open aquifer CO2 storage. The principal contents are as follows;

• Evaluation of regional flow of deep groundwater around the reser voir depth,
• Evaluation of seal integrity and fracture permeability through rock mechanical experiments
• Modeling and analysis of CO2 migration using seismic tomography technique,
• Basic studies on geochemical CO2 trapping,
• CO2 flux survey as a natural analogue of CO2 geological storage.

Outcome

The global warming due to a rapid increase of atmospheric CO2 is one of the serious problems that our society is facing. METI has presented a roadmap addressing the commercial basis CCS toward 2015. In the implementation of CCS in Japan, we have to take into account the peculiar geology of Japan. The technical report provides a scientific basis for the CCS in Japan incorporating saline aquifer storage, and will be used as fundamentals on the development of various techniques such as risk assessment, design for monitoring and so on in CCS, although there still remain several problems to be overcome.

Contact person

Toshiyuki Tosha, e-mail toshi-tosha{at}aist.go.jp