Could China Meet Its CO2 Reduction Goal By CO2-EOR?

China is the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gasses (GHG), the country generates 80% of its power from coal (Zhang, 2015), which emit the highest amounts of CO2 in relation to the energy it’s produced when burned. Coal is expected to remain the dominant component of China’s energy mix and any attempt to reduce GHG emission should consider the large-scale application of CCS technologies including CO2 storage through the CO2-EOR application (Sue and Fletcher, 2010).

China has ambitious goals to reduce CO2 emissions and meet with Paris agreement. The current 13^th Five-year plan (2016–2020) for CCS focusing on technology development with total investment of RMB 600-700 million for CCS R&D with an industry matching fund of around two billion. CCUS roadmap targets during the Five-Year plan: identify unique low-cost opportunities for CCS demonstration, launch at least two large-scale CCS demonstration projects, with an installed capacity to capture at least 2 million tons of CO₂ per year. Several studies have looked at potential CO2-EOR application in China and by considering power plants as a main CO2 supply source. Other industries such as cement, refinery, steel and biomass contribute significantly to total amounts of CO2 emission and at the same time have higher economic potential to feed CO2-EOR application. Few studies have looked at optimizing CO2 supply from different stationary sources versus points of demand (oil fields).

The main goal of this projct is to provide economic options to supply CO2 for potential oil field candidates. In doing so, we have the following objectives:

How much CO2 can be sequestered throughout CO2-EOR application

What/where are the most economic sources and sinks for such application

What is the additional oil recovery expected from CO2-EOR application in China

What is the percentage of CO2 emission reduction as a result of this application