Salt Rock Cavern Buffer for CO2 Injection Flexibility
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current methods for simultaneous capture, utilization, and storage of CO2 in the oil industry lack operational flexibility and efficiency, leading to suboptimal CO2 injection and storage, which compromises oil production and fails to maintain a negative carbon footprint over the useful life of an oil field.
Innovation Solution
A method utilizing thermomechanical cycling in caverns built in salt rock to act as a geological buffer, enabling cyclic and integrated CO2 storage and injection, allowing for optimal CO2 flow rates and pressures to enhance oil recovery and storage across various CCUS modalities, including depleted reservoirs, aquifers, and porous rocks.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If CO2 is continuously injected into injection wells to maximize hydrocarbon recovery, then oil production increases, but CO2 flow rate optimization becomes difficult and carbon footprint control deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a cavern in salt rock as an intermediary buffer between CO2 sources and injection wells. This intermediate storage facility decouples the CO2 injection process from direct atmospheric emissions, allowing independent optimization of injection rates for hydrocarbon recovery while maintaining overall carbon negativity through the buffer's regulatory function.
Solution Approach 2:
The system implements dynamic cycling of the cavern between filling and emptying states. During filling, excess CO2 is stored; during emptying, CO2 is released to injection wells. This dynamic operation enables flexible adjustment of CO2 flow rates to injection wells based on hydrocarbon recovery needs, while the cavern maintains the negative carbon footprint balance.
2Object-generated harmful factors
If CO2 is stored in geological formations for long-term storage, then carbon footprint is reduced, but operational flexibility and CO2 availability for injection decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The cavern operates through periodic cycles of filling and emptying. During filling phases, CO2 is stored to reduce carbon footprint; during emptying phases, CO2 is released to injection wells for hydrocarbon recovery operations. This periodic action reconciles the contradiction by providing both long-term storage capability and operational flexibility through timed release.
Solution Approach 2:
The system changes the operational parameters of CO2 storage by transitioning between different states (filling/emptying, pressurized/depressurized). These parameter changes enable the cavern to function both as a long-term storage medium for carbon footprint reduction and as a flexible supply source for injection wells when needed.
3Productivity
If multiple CCUS modalities are implemented simultaneously, then carbon capture efficiency increases, but system complexity and integration difficulty increases
Solution Approach 1:
The cavern in salt rock serves multiple functions: it acts as a buffer for CO2 cycling, a storage facility for excess CO2, a pressure regulation chamber, and an enabler for simultaneous CCUS modalities. This multi-functionality reduces system integration complexity by providing a single versatile component that supports various carbon capture, utilization, and storage operations.
Solution Approach 2:
The cavern acts as a central intermediary that connects and coordinates multiple CCUS modalities. By serving as a common buffer and regulation point, it simplifies the integration of different carbon capture and utilization processes, allowing them to operate simultaneously while maintaining overall system balance through the cavern's mediating function.
4Productivity
If CO2 injection rate is increased to maximize field recovery, then hydrocarbon production increases, but CO2 storage optimization and carbon negativity maintenance deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements feedback control through the cavern buffer. The cavern's filling and emptying cycles provide automatic feedback on CO2 supply and demand balance. When injection wells require more CO2 for enhanced recovery, the cavern empties to supply it; when capture exceeds utilization needs, the cavern fills to store the excess. This feedback mechanism optimizes both field recovery and CO2 storage simultaneously.
Solution Approach 2:
The dynamic cycling of the cavern between filling and emptying states enables flexible adjustment of CO2 flow rates to match injection well demands for maximum field recovery. At the same time, the overall carbon negativity is maintained through the buffer's ability to absorb excess CO2 during high-capture periods and release it during high-utilization periods.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This approach increases operational flexibility, maximizes hydrocarbon recovery, maintains a negative carbon footprint, and extends the useful life of oil fields by ensuring optimal CO2 flow and storage conditions, thereby enhancing both economic and environmental performance.
Implementation Method 1
the cavern acts as an intermediary or precursor, in a simultaneous and integrated way enabling other different CCUS modalities
Implementation Method 2
through thermomechanical analysis in a cavern built on salt rock
Data Source
AI summary
The present invention finds its field of application as a means of operational flexibility and enabling different simultaneous modalities for the capture, utilization and storage of CO2 in an integrated manner through thermomechanical cycling in a cavern built in salt rock. More particularly, in regions close to oil fields where there is a layer of evaporite rock close to the same and suitable for the construction of a cavern in salt rock, for its use as a geological buffer (lung) for CO2 and thus ensuring the Net Carbon Negative Oil during the enhanced oil recovery in the exploitation life of an oil reserve.