By Rebecca Elliott
Can new technology suck carbon dioxide, a prevalent greenhouse
gas, out of the air -- economically? More companies are betting
that it can, as governments adopt ambitious carbon-emissions
targets and investors grow increasingly concerned about the risks
of climate change.
Carbon-capture techniques have existed for decades. But it's
incredibly expensive -- not to mention energy intensive -- to
remove the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere on a large enough
scale to make a significant dent.
Now, Exxon Mobil Corp., Microsoft Corp. and others are focused
on reducing the cost and the amount of energy required to capture
carbon dioxide. Some companies are using giant fans to suck up air,
then separating the carbon dioxide chemically. One venture plans to
fill land in Arizona with dozens of accordionlike machines designed
to expand as they absorb the gas.
Carbon-capture technology works similarly to plant
photosynthesis in that it takes in carbon dioxide. But rather than
producing oxygen or carbohydrates, as plants do, the equipment
removes carbon dioxide from exhaust, ambient air or other gas
streams, and then concentrates the molecule so that it can be
stored underground, repurposed to make fuels or even used to
carbonate drinks.
Among those leading the charge are major oil companies such as
Occidental Petroleum Corp., Chevron Corp. and Exxon, whose fuels
contribute to global warming. Carbon dioxide traps heat, and most
domestic emissions of the gas come from burning fossil fuels,
according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Many oil producers are investing in capture technology because
they have an economic purpose for the gas: They inject it deep
underground to help release trapped oil. Known as enhanced oil
recovery, this process is the top use for captured carbon dioxide
globally, according to an analysis of large-scale carbon capture
and storage facilities by the Global CCS Institute, a nonprofit
that advocates for the technology.
Many companies expect there will be more reasons to buy and sell
the molecule in the coming decades, though that likely will depend
on lawmakers taking additional steps to regulate emissions, such as
by putting a price on carbon.
"Part of this has to be economic," says Robert Peterson, a
senior vice president for Houston-based Occidental, a leader in
enhanced oil recovery.
Occidental gets nearly all of the carbon dioxide it injects
underground from naturally occurring carbon-dioxide reservoirs. But
in the future the company wants captured carbon to play a larger
role so that it can take advantage of federal tax incentives, help
meet corporate environmental targets and eventually market its
fuels as low-carbon.
To do so, Occidental has joined with Canadian firm Carbon
Engineering Ltd. to build a facility in the Permian Basin of Texas
and New Mexico that would take up to roughly 1 million metric tons
of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere annually. That's equivalent
to the greenhouse-gas emissions from more than 200,000 cars a year,
according to EPA estimates.
Carbon Engineering plans to start construction next year and
open the plant in 2023. It would be the world's largest facility
designed to remove carbon dioxide from the ambient air, according
to the Global CCS Institute, relying on industrial fans to bring
air into contact with a liquid solution that binds to the
greenhouse gas. Existing large capture plants suck up the gas where
it's more concentrated, such as at natural-gas processing
plants.
Carbon Engineering declined to provide a cost estimate for the
facility.
Some find the practice of capturing carbon to augment oil
production troubling. "We see at least a strong danger of a moral
hazard here," says Jan Wurzbacher, chief executive of Swiss
carbon-capture firm Climeworks AG, which doesn't sell its carbon
dioxide to oil companies. "Will it just allow us to emit more
fossil fuels?"
Climeworks clients include a Swiss greenhouse that uses the gas
to help plants grow bigger; Coca-Cola HBC Switzerland, which uses
the carbon dioxide to make seltzer; and even individuals who want
to offset their carbon footprint by paying to bury the gas that
Climeworks captures. At its facility in Hinwil, a village in
Switzerland, fans suck air into containers roughly the size of
small cars, where filters remove the carbon dioxide.
Carbon capture isn't cheap. If current technology were
implemented at scale, it would cost between about $80 and $160 a
metric ton to capture and store the carbon dioxide produced by
natural-gas power plants, and between about $125 and $449 a metric
ton to take the gas out of the ambient air, where it's more
diffuse, according to Goldman Sachs estimates.
In the U.S. -- which generated roughly 5 billion metric tons of
carbon dioxide in 2017, EPA data show -- the tax credit for
capturing and storing carbon dioxide was less than $30 a metric ton
as of 2019, though that is set to increase to as much as $50 in the
coming years.
Globally, the highest price on carbon as of last year was about
$121 a metric ton, in Sweden, according to the World Bank.
"Ultimately this is a waste-management problem," says Arizona
State University engineering professor Klaus Lackner, who developed
the accordionlike machine. "Any carbon-based fuel that you combust
will produce CO2, and if you put that in the atmosphere, it becomes
your responsibility to take it out."
Mr. Lackner calls his machines "mechanical trees" for their
ability to filter carbon dioxide from the ambient air. One version
of the device is about 5 feet wide and can expand to about 30 feet
tall, exposing specialized disks that bind to carbon dioxide
molecules. When the disks get wet, the carbon is released and can
be collected.
Silicon Kingdom Holdings Ltd., an Irish company with ties to
ASU, plans to commercialize the technology, and sell the carbon
dioxide and potentially carbon credits or offsets, if those markets
take off. It plans to install a dozen of the devices in the Phoenix
area this year and eventually build a 360-unit farm in the
state.
Powering carbon-capture equipment also typically consumes a lot
of energy, potentially undercutting the climate benefits.
Generally, researchers have assumed that for every 100
kilowatt-hours of electricity a power plant produces, an additional
25 kilowatt-hours are needed to collect the associated carbon
dioxide emissions, according to Stanford University engineering
professor Mark Jacobson. However, Mr. Jacobson's research indicates
that figure can be as high as about 50 kilowatt-hours.
"There's really no case ever where carbon capture is better than
just taking renewable energy and replacing a coal or gas plant,"
says Mr. Jacobson, who has studied the health and climate effects
of carbon-dioxide removal.
Microsoft last month pledged to invest $1 billion over the next
four years in the development of carbon-removal and reduction
technology as part of a climate initiative that would have the
technology company become "carbon negative" by 2030.
Exxon also is working to address some of those issues by joining
with Connecticut-based FuelCell Energy Inc. to develop technology
that would remove carbon dioxide from industrial exhaust
electrochemically while also converting natural gas to
electricity.
Chevron has invested in companies that are fine-tuning how to
capture the greenhouse gas more efficiently. Among them are Carbon
Engineering and Svante Inc., a Canadian firm whose filters extract
the carbon dioxide produced from industrial processes such as
burning natural gas or making cement.
Chevron also operates one of the world's largest projects to
bury carbon dioxide, in Australia, which the government required
Chevron to build as part of a natural-gas development there. In
that case, however, Chevron isn't taking carbon dioxide out of the
air. Instead, it separates the molecule from natural gas as it
flows from underground.
"The demand for energy is growing, and the expectations to lower
the carbon footprint are increasing," says Barbara Burger,
president of Chevron's venture-capital arm.
More in The Future of Everything | Energy
Explore what's next for energy and climate.
Fusion Startups Step in to Realize Decades-Old Clean Power
Dream
Governments have spent billions of dollars studying the
emissions-free energy source. Now, private ventures are building
smaller, faster, cheaper reactors.
The Key to Keeping the Lights On: Artificial Intelligence
Power companies are turning to AI, drones and sensors to curtail
outages, save money and help operate an increasingly complex
electricity grid.
A Sci-fi Author's Boldest Vision of Climate Change: Surviving
It
Kim Stanley Robinson's novels imagine environmental collapse in
arresting precision -- and humanity finding a way forward
How a Utility's Counterintuitive Strategy Might Fuel a Greener
Future
Consumers Energy aims to slash carbon emissions and replace
traditional coal-fired plants with solar farms by betting on
smarter energy consumption
Read the full report.
Write to Rebecca Elliott at rebecca.elliott@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
February 12, 2020 09:23 ET (14:23 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Occidental Petroleum (NYSE:OXY)
Historical Stock Chart
From Mar 2024 to Apr 2024
Occidental Petroleum (NYSE:OXY)
Historical Stock Chart
From Apr 2023 to Apr 2024