Octio will do a pilot project to assess the permanent monitoring of CO2 storage under the seabed for CLIMIT. CLIMIT is a program to encourage commercial development of technology for capturing and storing CO2; administered jointly by Gassnova and the Norwegian Research Council.
When CO2 is stored under the seabed, it is essential to have a secure system for the identification of possible leakage before accidents happen. Traditionally, monitoring of CO2 injection into the seabed has been done with seismic shooting from ships. However, permanent seismic monitoring is more and more commonly used for various subsea surveillance tasks, such as monitoring of oil and gas injector wells.
An assumption is that monitoring of CO2 storage under the seabed can be done more effectvely and less expensively by permanent monitoring. With traditional seismic shooting, there are long intervals between repeat surveys. With permanent monitoring, changes are identified immediately. The purpose of Octio’s project is to verify a cost effective system for subsea CO2 storage combining permanent monitoring of the seabed with other forms of environmental monitoring of the sea in a complete warning system.
Octio has a proprietary technology for permanent monitoring of the seabed. The tasks are solved with seismic nodes placed on the seabed in the actual area. These will send data about changes in the seabed continuously to a surface vessel, platform or a central onshore. In addition, these signals are combined with other input from oceanographic and environmental monitoring so that those responsible continuously have a good picture of suspicious changes in the seabed or the environment. Octio collaborates with leading players in these areas to provide a virtually complete picture.
Managing director Bjarte Fagerås says that CO2 storage can be an important area for Octio in the future: “ Security is a key issue to make CO2 storage politically accepted, and permanent monitoring will be an important contribution to this. It’s very positive that Octio is involved in research in this area so we can offer good solutions when capturing and storage of CO2 becomes a reality.”
“ CLIMIT provides support to technology development and demonstration activities within the value chain of CO2 capturing – transportation and storage. An important research area connected to storage is to be able to monitor CO2 storage in a deep sand sediment, both with regards to following distribution of the gas in the reservoir and detecting leakage at an early stage. The technology Octio has developed can enable effective monitoring, and we look forward to seeing consideration of cost as well as the technical possibilities that this technology can offer,” says senior adviser Svein Staal Eggen about Octio’s project, on behalf of CLIMIT.
Octio will conduct the study in 2012.
[mappress] Source: Octio , November 04, 2011; Image: CLIMIT