Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) always seemed a bit kludgy - sort of like emptying the ocean with a teaspoon. The technologies have been proven - but cost has always been the issue, mostly because of the scale of the problem. The IPCC estimates we need to reduce CO2 emissions by 25-30 Billion Tons equivalent (GtCO2e) per year. Some working technologies have demonstrated costs at around $1000 per ton - so that's $25-30 Trillion. And that's before you talk about the potential for leakage, transport leaks, etc.
Featured Articles
- Blog
The Longest Time - For Carbon-Capture Projects, Storage Risks Require Decades of Monitoring
When carbon dioxide (CO2) is captured and stored deep underground, a process known as carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), it’s supposed to remain there permanently. Although much of today’s emphasis is on moving carbon-capture projects from aspirational to operational, there are long-term challenges to making sure those emissions stay put away for good, even if the odds of a significant leakage are considered remote. In today’s RBN blog, we look at the common risk factors for carbon-capture projects, explain why a site’s post-injection care-and-monitoring period can last for several decades, and detail the leakage risks that project planners must be prepared to handle.
- Blog
Into the Woods - Yosemite Clean Energy's 'Stump to Pump' Plans Rest on Local Partnerships
California faces a broad set of challenges when it comes to reducing wildfires, which have been increasingly frequent and intense over the last decade — impacting the lives of those dealing with the threat, not to mention effects on the economy and environment. Separately, the state has been working to reduce transportation-related pollution and incentivize the development and use of a wide array of alternative fuels. Yosemite Clean Energy (YCE), which announced plans for its first plant site in late 2021, has an approach it says will not only make the state a cleaner and safer place but also foster the development of new transportation fuels. In today’s RBN blog, we look at YCE’s plans to turn wood waste into renewable fuels, how its unique “Stump to Pump” approach relies on partnerships with local communities, and the green hydrogen and renewable natural gas it plans to produce at sites across California.
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Space Oddity - How Rocket Technology Could Help Power the Energy Transition
Back in the early days of the Space Race, popular culture envisaged aerospace technology that might one day have us all zooming around town like George Jetson in his flying car. That hasn’t turned out to be the case, but developments that have evolved from rocket technology could one day play a different role here in the 21st century, where producing cleaner power and managing the energy transition are two key global goals. In today’s RBN blog, we look at an innovative “bioenergy with carbon capture and sequestration” (BECCS) project being undertaken in California by Clean Energy Systems (CES) and its partners, how the company’s technology is designed to work, and what “carbon-negative energy” might mean.
