Climate Goals

“Oil and gas production must decline by 3% each year from now until 2050 … and most existing and planned fossil-fuel projects would be unviable as a result.

[Ref. (1.5 deg C) : https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02444-3]

The declines required in the global production of oil & gas by climate targets can still be achieved if oil & gas reserves are instead exploited in a new way, without risking energy security. Our patented process and patent pending technology would avoid the forecasted energy shortfall associated with these oil & gas production declines, by replacing it with at-source reformation of oil & gas to generate hydrogen in the wellbore with the immediate downhole carbon capture.

This change in how we consume our energy will transform the oil & gas industry into a hydrogen and CCS industry and enable an increase in low carbon energy production.

Hydrogen Blending in Natural Gas Networks

Several studies have shown that hydrogen can be blended together into existing natural gas pipeline distribution networks with little or no upgrades required. However, the upper limits to the hydrogen volume in the natural gas blend depend on the steel alloy grade. This hydrogen blending capability enables the early commencement of the decarbonisation of oil & gas resources long before the upper hydrogen volume limit is reached and expensive upgrading of existing infrastructure is required. This allows for the gradual replacement and transition of carbon-based energy within the pipelines by slowly increasing the percentage of hydrogen in the natural gas blend over time, as the number of converted wells and the generated hydrogen volumes increase. The oil & gas producers could then immediately start on the path to the reduction of their carbon footprint. The overall economics are sustainable, together with the ability to fulfill the time schedules and achieve the net zero and climate goals.

Transportation of the generated hydrogen (or electricity), instead of oil & gas, would also reduce transportation emissions of these greenhouse gasses and so their associated climate impact will also reduce to zero.

Regional Hydrogen Blending Studies 

Emissions

There is very little dispute about the emissions associated with the combustion of fossil fuels and the differences between them: CO₂ emissions per unit of energy produced from gas are around 40% lower than coal and around 20% lower than oil. However, there is much less consensus over the indirect emissions of oil or gas on the path from production to final consumer, in particular the level of methane emissions that can occur – whether by accident or by design – along the way.

Total indirect greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from oil and gas operations today are around 5 200 million tonnes (Mt) of carbon-dioxide equivalent (CO2-eq), 15% of total energy sector GHG emissions. Methane, a much more powerful (though shorter-lived) GHG than CO₂, is the largest single component of these indirect emissions.

[Ref.: https://www.iea.org/reports/methane-tracker-2020/methane-from-oil-gas]

Carbon Storage Rates

Global rates of CCS deployment are significantly below those anticipated to be needed to limit global warming to 1.5°C or 2°C, with the present global storage infrastructure only accommodating 40 MtCO₂ /yr. It has been estimated that there is likely to be a need for 7 – 8 GtCO₂ /yr of storage by 2050, and a cumulative storage of approximately 350 – 1200 GtCO₂ by 2100, to keep temperatures below the 1.5°C rise threshold. With typical CO₂ injection wells having injectivity of about 1 – 2 MtCO₂ /year, this will require the global development of many thousands of CO₂ injection wells by 2050. This would be an enormous undertaking, given the multi-year time scale required to plan, develop and commission such wells and the associated reservoirs and transport infrastructure.

At present, about 1 MtCO₂/yr can be injected through a typical well into a subsurface storage system.

Based on this injection rate, as an example, a future global CO₂ storage industry would need 7,000 – 8,000 wells feeding large subsurface storage systems to reach the proposed targets. To build up this global industry by 2050, an average of 300 – 400 wells per year would require successful commissioning. Drilling rigs can drill into the subsurface at a typical rate of 10 – 100m/day, so depending on the rock type and depth, it may take around 1 – 2 months to drill a 1.0 – 2.5 km well. Development of 300 – 400 wells each year would thus require about 90 – 120 dedicated drilling rigs in continuous operation.

[Ref. : https://royalsociety.org/-/media/policy/projects/geological-carbon-storage/Geological-Carbon- Storage_briefing.pdf]

Economic and Social Benefits

The adaptation of existing oil & gas and geothermal wells, pipelines and facilities, together with intelligent, sustainable exploitation of oil and gas reserves, has clear economic and social benefits, some of which are listed below.

Sustainability

• reliable, long-term delivery of energy with price stability
• thermally enhanced geothermal output via CIGG (Carbon Injected & Gasified Geothermal), lowering the energy costs of the geothermal energy resource
• more revenue streams; CCS (tax deductions and credits), Power, H₂, water
• low upfront capital costs, with predictable incentives to support operating costs
• no high-cost CO₂ shipping & transportation requirements
• no expensive CO₂ pipelines, or upgrade requirements, as additional CO₂ corrosion risks to existing pipelines are removed – together with the CO₂ delivery requirement
• reduced requirement for rare earth metals when compared to green energy technologies
• can blend H₂ into the existing natural gas infrastructure (studies and testing have shown that a min of approximately 20% v/v of Hydrogen can be blended without requiring facilities upgrades.

Learn more about hydrogen blending ⮞

Better Public Relations for Energy Companies

• seen as green energy innovator
• seen to also fix ‘other’ climate problems (i.e. CCS, H₂ & water)
• seen to contribute to reducing the national carbon footprint

Carbon Taxes – How to Reduce Them

• energy companies are motivated to employ technical means to reduce carbon taxes, in order to avoid the “polluter pays” edict

Carbon Credits – How to Increase Them

• energy companies are motivated to employ technical means for carbon capture and storage (CCS) to generate another revenue stream

Continued Development of Strategic Energy Reserves

• public opinion and socio-economic benefits are clear; given the production of clean, carbon-free hydrogen, concerns over the social license to exploit oil & gas reserves in many jurisdictions will be minimised

Significantly Increase H₂ Volume Supply to Industry

• higher volumes of supply from direct methane conversion will produce H₂ at a lower unit cost

Social Impact

• the use of carbon-free, clean, hydrogen energy, will have direct health impacts on society. This health benefit will directly correlate to a reduction in costs to national health services from respiratory linked diseases

Reduced Geological Risk

• existing oil & gas reservoirs have wellbores already drilled, geology mapped, and their reservoir flow characteristics extensively modelled. Their geological risk (e.g. faults & flow barriers) is therefore lower when compared with newly licenced reservoirs acreage.
• any new geological structures to be drilled for CCS use will come with an inherently higher geological risk due lack of geological data and mapping. Lowering this risk will require expensive and time-consuming seismic mapping and interpretation, together with actual geological data points (i.e. costly exploration and injection wellbores that penetrate the rock formations deep underground). This mapping, data processing and drilling of new wells creates significant time delays before any injection can take place into any newly awarded licence. Conversely, existing licences have infrastructure already in place and can be made available for CCS injection in much shorter time scales.