Status and Potential of Carbon Capture and Storage in China

CCS is particularly important to China due to its large and rapidly rising emissions and high dependence on fossil fuel. This paper presents the key results of the joint research to evaluate opportunities for the deployment of CCS technologies within China. It focuses on the basin scale theoretical carbon dioxide storage capacity and carbon dioxide point emission estimation in China. There is a total estimated theoretical carbon dioxide geological storage capacity of 3160 billion ton in China’s onshore and offshore basins, including a storage capacity in deep saline formations accounting for 99% of total geological storage capacity. China also has an annual emission about 3.9 billion ton of carbon dioxide from large point sources in 2007. The preliminary cost curve analysis suggests that the majority of emissions from China’s large carbon dioxide point sources can be stored in large deep saline formations at estimated transport and storage costs of less than $10/t carbon dioxide. In view of initial proximity and cost analysis, there is significant potential for CCS technologies to deliver deep, sustainable and cost-effective emissions reductions for China over the course of this century. As to CCS technology status, many components of CCS technologies have been existed in industry sectors and are ready for CCS deployment. The status of CCS technologies and many pilot experiments of carbon dioxide geological storage show that there are no major technological barriers to carbon dioxide geological storage in China. However, there are many non-technical barriers to large-scale deployment of CCS technologies in China, such as the competition of CCS comparing to other mitigation options, high cost of carbon dioxide capture, long term safety of carbon dioxide stored, long liability of carbon dioxide stored, legal problem, and so on. A major challenge in the implementation of carbon dioxide storage is the high cost of carbon dioxide capture and compression, particularly for dilute streams like those from power plants and industrial combustion processes. If those barriers are solved, CCS technologies can develop steadily from carbon dioxide -EOR/EGR to deep saline formation and from pilot phase with early opportunities to large scale phase with economical benefits. At last, the possible roadmap and the framework for international collaboration on how China will achieve deployment at scale were given. The resolution of these challenges will affect feasibility of large-scale carbon dioxide geological storage and will accelerate or delay the deployment of this technology in China.