Reducing carbon dioxide emissions with enhanced oil recovery projects: A life cycle assessment approach

A wide range of industries are investigating methods of reducing their emis sions of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide(CO2), methane (CH4), and nitrous pride (N2O). Several options have been identified ranging from ener gy efficiency and reforestation to capture and storage in oceans, aquifers, or underground. Although greenhouse gases are not yet regulated, the power generation and petroleum industries are already considering greenhouse gas capture and storage methods to reduce their emissions to the atmosphere. P referred options are the ones utilizing CO2 as a product and therefore prov iding an additional economic benefit to the oil and gas production process. Currently, CO2 is widely used for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) projects to extract more oil out of aging reservoirs: Thus, storage of CO2 in active re servoirs does not require technology advances and offers the advantage of r educing greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere. The present research co nducted a life cycle assessment to determine the benefits derived from star ing CO2 in active reservoirs while enhancing the,extraction of oil and the impacts on the environment over the process lifetime. The potential for CO2 storage in: a specific oil reservoir in Texas was demonstrated, as well as the mass balance of greenhouse gas emissions generated from the energy-int ensive process. Our findings suggest that the storage capacity of this rese rvoir is huge,the process emissions are minimal in comparison, and the EOR activity is almost carbon-neutral when comparing net storage potential and gasoline emissions from the additional oil extracted.