WESTCARB

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s contribution to the West Coast Regional Carbon (WESTCARB) Sequestration Partnership is a public-private partnership aimed at assessing carbon sequestration opportunities in the Western United States and Canada.  The effort is led by the California Energy Commission, which is responsible for the overall conduct of this work.  The effort involves numerous private sector and public sector partners, who will be responsible for carrying out various aspects of the project.  Over-arching goals of the WESTCARB Phase III effort include:

(1)  Promoting a better understanding of injectivity, capacity and storativity of CO₂ in typical West Coast formations;

(2)  Demonstrating the security and commercial viability of industrial-scale CO2 storage in a deep saline formation to pave the way for future widespread West Coast deployment of CO₂ capture and geological storage.

 

The proposed work for the WESTCARB phase III effort will cover the following:

(1)  Site Characterization Efforts in support of local and regional reservoir model development, evaluation of formation capacity and injectivity, and regulatory permitting;
(2)  Risk Assessment and Mitigation Planning in support of site selection, public safety, environmental protection, storage effectiveness, and regulatory permitting;
(3)  Performance Monitoring in support of public safety, environmental protection, regulatory oversight, and demonstration of storage effectiveness.

West Coast Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership Website

 

 

Task 1. Two pilot tests of CO2 storage at the Rio Vista Gas Reservoir, California &  underlying saline formation.
Task 2. A Pilot Test of CO2 Storage in a saline formation underlying the Navajo Generating Station in Arizona.
Task 3. Enhancement and testing of screening risk assessment tool for selecting CO2 storage sites.
Task 4. Outreach activities associated with the WESTCARB Project.