Optimal CO2 Capture and Utilization (CCU) Supply Chain Network for Enhanced Oil Recovery

More than 60% of the total anthropogenic CO₂ emissions in the U.S. are emitted from stationary sources such as power plants, iron and steel industries, cement plants, chemical plants, refineries, gas processing plants, petrochemicals, etc. While CO₂ capture and storage (CCS) [1] shows potential to reduce CO₂ emissions from these sources, several challenges must be addressed before large-scale CCS becomes a reality. One major challenge is the lack of sufficient economic drivers to deploy CO₂ capture in power and chemical industries. Although it is possible to reduce 50–80% of the current stationary emissions in the U.S. through the optimal design of a nationwide CO₂ capture, utilization and sequestration (CCUS) supply chain network [2], even the most advanced and optimized materials and processes would cost more than $35/ton of CO₂ captured and compressed [2,3]. While significant efforts [2–10] have been made to reduce the cost of CO₂ capture and compression from stationary sources, the cost of CO₂capture remains high.

 

   To this end, utilizing anthropogenic CO₂ from stationary sources for enhanced oil recovery (CO₂-EOR) can be an influential economic driver to encourage CO₂ capture and utilization. In fact, many of the stationary CO₂ sources in the U.S. are close to oil and gas reservoirs. CO₂-EOR potentially enables incremental oil recovery up to 15% of the original oil in place (OOIP). The amount of oil that can be recovered through CO₂-EOR is currently estimated to be almost 400 billion barrels in the U.S. alone [11]. Opportunities exist to supplement and eventually replace the naturally occurring CO₂ with CO₂ from anthropogenic sources for enhanced oil recovery (CO₂-EOR).

 

   In this work, we propose a novel CO₂ Capture and Utilization (CCU) supply chain network model to integrate nationwide, statewide or regional CO₂ capture and CO₂-EOR activities. While doing so, we consider simultaneous selection of source plants, capture technologies, capture materials, CO₂ pipelines, locations of CO₂-EOR sites, and CO₂ utilization amounts. The objective is to maximize the net profit from the CCU supply chain network, while satisfying the minimum CO₂ demands for CO₂-EOR. The net profit is obtained by including the total annual revenue minus the total annualized cost of constructing and operating the entire CCU supply chain network. The revenue from CO₂ utilization through CO₂-EOR would be generated from selling high purity CO₂ to the prospective CO₂-EOR sites, and the total CCU cost for a source is calculated by combining the investment, operating and materials costs of flue gas dehydration, CO₂ capture, compression, transportation and injection to CO₂-EOR sites. The overall network not only maximizes the profit from CCU activities, it also contributes to the overall reduction of CO₂emissions from the stationary sources.

 

   The novel features of our CCU supply chain network model include: (1) large network of CO₂ pipelines connecting the sources, capture plants and CO₂-EOR sites, (2) selection of sources and utilization sites to maximize the overall profit from CO₂ utilization, (3) simultaneous selection of capture materials and technologies with variable CO₂ capture amounts, (4) rigorous modeling, simulation and optimization of flue gas dehydration, CO₂ capture and compression, and transportation alternatives to obtain CCU costs, (5) no CO₂ sequestration in saline formations, (6) CO₂ capture with variable CO₂ recovery, instead of considering a minimum specification of 90% on CO₂ recovery, and (7) consideration of real geographic locations of sources and utilization sites, reliable estimates of CO₂ emissions and demands. Each selected source in the CCU network supplies to one or multiple CO₂-EOR sites to satisfy different CO₂ utilization demands. The CO₂ recovery from a source can be adjusted based on the demand of nearby CO₂-EOR sites. We show that such flexibility in CO₂ recovery significantly reduces the overall CCU costs and increases the net profit. Through designing nationwide, statewide and regional CCU supply chain networks, we also quantitatively demonstrate the applicability of CO₂-EOR in reducing CO₂ emissions in an economically viable manner. The proposed network of CO₂ pipelines would also enable CO₂transportation between sources and utilization sites which are located apart from each other by as far as 200 miles. 

 

References

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