(125a) Lessons Learned from the Secarb Integrated CO2 Capture and Storage Project

The United States Department of Energy (DOE) established seven Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnerships (RCSPs) in 2003. The Southeast Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership (SECARB), whose lead organization is the Southern States Energy Board (SSEB), represents 13 States within the south eastern United States.The SECARB Anthropogenic Test has entered into an efficiency enhancement phase for the CO₂ capture unit and a post-injection monitoring phase for the CO₂ geologic storage reservoir.

The CO₂ capture unit is located at Alabama Power Company’s James M. Barry Electric Generating Plant (Plant Barry) in Bucks, Alabama.Alabama Power is the second largest subsidiary of Southern Company, serving homes, businesses and industries in the southern two-thirds of Alabama. The capture facility, equivalent to 25 megawatts (MW), utilizes Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America’s (MHIA) KM-CDR^TMpost-combustion amine capture technology. The capture unit utilizes MHIA’s proprietary KS-1^TM solvent to achieve high levels of CO₂retention with significant reductions in energy penalty.

Southern Company is working with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries on continued testing at the 25 MW CO₂ capture and compression plant at Plant Barry. Most recently, a high efficiency system (HES) was installed to support a DOE/National Energy Technology Laboratory-funded project. The HES is designed to recover heat from the inlet flue gas and CO₂ regenerator. This heat is then used directly in the Rankine cycle by preheating boiler feedwater. The HES will demonstrate an increased efficiency of the CO₂ capture unit and will have the following ancillary benefits:

• Reduced water usage in the flue gas desulfurization system;
• Better SO₃ capture by condensation on fly ash;
• Better ESP performance through reduced gas volume and lower ash resistivity; and
• Better Hazardous Air Pollutants capture performance due to condensation enhancement.

The SECARB project is the largest integrated carbon capture, transportation and storage project at a pulverized coal-fired power plant in the USA. It has resulted in the deployment of the world’s largest CO₂ capture and compression plant for a coal fired boiler in Texas. This new commercial facility will have a CO₂capture capacity of 4,776 metric tons per day.

From August 2012 until September 2014, a total of 114,104 metric tons of CO₂captured at Plant Barry were transported by pipeline and stored underground in a deep, saline geologic formation within the Citronelle Dome located in Citronelle, Alabama. The injection target is the lower Cretaceous Paluxy Formation which occurs at a depth of 2,865 meters (9,400 feet). The injection wells and surface facilities are located on property which is owned fee simple by the field’s operator, Denbury Onshore, LLC.

Field monitoring data indicates that the CO₂ has remained within the permitted Area of Review and no negative seismic anomalies are present above or in the caprock, thus indicating the CO₂ is contained within the injection zone. Post injection monitoring will continue for a period of three years.