ECAPP report chronicles oil sands progress

What is the industry doing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) from the oil sands?

It's a question seemingly on everyone's minds these days but - judging from a report released by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) this spring entitled Environmental Challenges and Progress in Canada's Oil Sands - the answers are, well, encouraging.

Since 1990, the industry has reduced oil sands carbon-dioxide (CO2) intensity by 45 per cent.

New technology is one reason for the optimism. One example of a technology being demonstrated and moving into the commercial stage is Petrobank's Toe-to-Heel-Air-Injection in situ technology. This process relies on underground combustion instead of the more common steam process to warm the thick bitumen so it can be extracted.

Another technology is the utilization of electric submersible pumps. This innovation increases steam efficiency and results in lower GHG intensities, with some as low as 0.06 tonnes of CO2 per barrel. While the progress is encouraging, CAPP says, “much more is required to meet new legislative requirements and public concern.”

Capture and storage (CCS) is another technology, though certainly not a silver bullet, CAPP says. Many companies are currently evaluating how to capture CO2 emitted during production and store it underground. Other projects involve the transportation of the captured CO2 to conventional oil and gas wells for injection. In this process, not only is the CO2 stored underground, it also helps recover more oil and gas from wells with dwindling or ceased production.

While CCS holds some promise, CAPP says, its application on a broad scale will require significant investments in new technologies and transportation infrastructure.

EnCana Corporation's Weyburn project southeastern Saskatchewan currently brings CO2 from a gasification facility in North Dakota, for injection into a mature reservoir to enhance oil recovery. To date, more than 7 million tonnes of CO2 have been injected and stored in this field. Ultimately, Weyburn's target is to store 30 million tonnes of CO2, equivalent to the CO2 emissions of an estimated 6.8 million cars over one year.

The oil sands industry is constantly researching new technologies and processes to lower GHG emissions. One example is geothermal processes, which could provide a low-emission alternative to the natural gas that is currently used to provide heat and steam in the oil sands production process. In this process, water would be pumped several kilometers below ground and exposed to hot rocks in the earth's crust, where it would be heated. The water would then be pumped back to the surface for use in production.

A consortium of companies, called GeoPOS, along with a research arm of the Alberta government, are looking to test this technology by drilling a deep well to test the geology in the Fort McMurray area. This is a long-term investigation with potential commercial application of geothermal energy in the oil sands being at least a decade away, CAPP concludes.

For more information please go to: www.capp.ca