Webinar: The Role of Geoscience in the Critical Evaluation of Subsurface Carbon Storage Sites

Abstract:

The Anglo-Polish Super Basin forms an important petroleum province that stretches across NW Europe. It contains many giant gas fields, primarily located beneath a thick Upper Permian (Zechstein Group) evaporite canopy and a smaller amount of oil and gas in Mesozoic reservoirs in the supra-salt section. Although exploration activity continues in the super basin, discoveries have diminished in size, many fields have been decommissioned it is beginning a transformation from an area with a rich petroleum heritage to a new, low-carbon energy hub.

Given its favorable geology, infrastructure, and the location of major industrial emitters in NW Europe, offshore parts of the super basin are being evaluated and re-purposed for renewable technologies like wind and geothermal energy, and as a site for subsurface carbon dioxide, hydrogen, compressed air and methane gas storage. The use of a rich, dense, and high fidelity seismic, well log, core, and pressure datasets acquired during petroleum exploration and production activities provide the basis for a play-based exploration assessment of the super basin’s carbon storage potential.

The results of our analysis of the offshore waters of the UK suggest that storage in traps containing Carboniferous and Permian (pre-salt) and Triassic (post-salt) clastic reservoirs have the potential to extend the life of the mature super basin during the energy transition. The detailed evaluation of the Rotliegend Group, from which most of the gas in the basin has been derived, enables a prospective sub-salt carbon storage reservoir play fairway to be defined, common risks to be identified, and composite maps to be produced that show where the best storage locations are situated. Similarly, mapping of depleted fields and dry closures created by salt mobility (halokinesis) and containing Triassic Bacton Group (Bunter Sandstone Formation) reservoirs provides a basis on which to build a carbon storage prospect and lead inventory in the supra-salt section.

In addition to the geological criteria, the results of the research effort also highlight the need to be aware of non-geological risks including the integrity of the legacy well stock and co-location issues that arise from the competition for offshore areas, especially wind farms fixed to the sea-bed that can constrain the areas available for carbon storage that lie below them

John Underhill is Aberdeen University’s Director for Energy Transition and Professor in Geoscience and Energy Transition, a post he took up in March 2022. He is the academic executive director of the pan-UK’s collaborative Centre of Doctoral Training (CDT) GeoNetZero, an academic-industry partnership that sees over 170 PhDs investigating the role that geoscience plays in the low carbon energy transition and challenge to meet net zero emissions targets.

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