Wyoming's CarbonSAFE Phase II Project at Basin Electric's Dry Fork Station

Building on the prefeasibility work completed by the University of Wyoming’s Project Team during the first phase of the Wyoming CarbonSAFE project (DE-FE0029375), the Department of Energy has funded the Feasibility Phase II (DE-FE0031624) to be conducted at Basin Electric’s Dry Fork Power Station (DFS), near Gillette Wyoming.

The project team consists of a highly qualified team of companies and subject matter experts. The project team is organized into three topical areas; Site Characterization, Community Outreach and Economics, and Future Site Plans. The project team consists of the site host, Basin Electric’s DFS in Gillette. The internal University of Wyoming team members include the UW Center for Economic Geology Research, UW College or Engineering and Applied Science, UW College of Law, UW College of Business, and the Enhanced Oil Recovery Institute. External project team members include; Advanced Resources International, Carbon Geocycle, KKR, Energy and Environmental Research Center at UND, and Schlumberger.

Phase II Goals and Objectives include three main types of objectives; technical, non-technical, and operational. Specific technical objectives include evaluating storage complex feasibility; identifying risks that have the potential to prevent the storage complex from serving as a commercial storage site; developing commercial-scale approaches to monitoring, verification, and accounting (MVA), and generating analyses and approaches to support UIC Class VI well permitting. The non-technical objectives include refining and updating the project’s commercial scale economic model, regulatory analysis, and CO₂ management strategy surrounding DFS; implementing the DFSpublic outreach plan; and preparing a Phase III site characterization plan. Finally, the two operational goals include drilling a successful stratigraphic test well and acquiring new 3D seismic data.

This presentation will discuss the transdisciplinary team and approach to UW’s Phase II CarbonSAFE Project that endeavors to advance commercial scale CCUS, incorporating the potential for beneficial reuse of CO₂, saline storage of CO₂, and the possibility of CO₂ storage incidental to CO₂-EOR.