Carbon capture and storage gets a clean bill of health

IT DOESN'T look like we will stop putting out carbon dioxide, but we might at least be able to bury it.

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) could slow climate change by locking up CO₂. There are concerns that the gas could leak out of deep geological storage, but two of the largest pilot projects have been given a clean bill of health.

As well as adding to climate change, CO₂ leaks would be toxic. In January a family living near the Weyburn-Midale CO₂ Project in Saskatchewan, Canada, found unusually high levels of CO₂ in their farm's water. An independent report by the International Performance Assessment Centre for Geologic Storage of CO₂ has found the gas did not come from the storage reservoir.

Stuart Gilfillan of the University of Edinburgh, UK, who took part in the investigation, has found that CO₂ leaking from deep underground has higher levels of helium than CO₂ from other sources (International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control, DOI: 10.1016/j.ijggc.2011.08.008). That means leaks from storage facilities can be easily identified. The Canadian water samples contained normal levels of helium.

In Australia, the CO2CRC project stored 65,000 tonnes of CO₂in a depleted gas field in 2008 and 2009. So far, it reports no signs of leaks (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1107255108).

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