Evaluating the Climate Benefits of CO sub( 2)Enhanced Oil Recovery Using Life Cycle Analysis

This study uses life cycle analysis (LCA) to evaluate the greenhouse gas (GHG) performance of carbon dioxide (CO...) enhanced oil recovery (EOR) systems. A detailed gate-to-gate LCA model of EOR was developed and incorporated into a cradle-to-grave boundary with a functional unit of 1 MJ of combusted gasoline. The cradle-to-grave model includes two sources of CO...: natural domes and anthropogenic (fossil power equipped with carbon capture). A critical parameter is the crude recovery ratio, which describes how much crude is recovered for a fixed amount of purchased CO... When CO... is sourced from a natural dome, increasing the crude recovery ratio decreases emissions, the opposite is true for anthropogenic CO... When the CO... is sourced from a power plant, the electricity coproduct is assumed to displace existing power. With anthropogenic CO..., increasing the crude recovery ratio reduces the amount of CO... required, thereby reducing the amount of power displaced and the corresponding credit. Only the anthropogenic EOR cases result in emissions lower than conventionally produced crude. This is not specific to EOR, rather the fact that carbon-intensive electricity is being displaced with captured electricity, and the fuel produced from that system receives a credit for this displacement. (ProQuest: ... denotes formulae/symbols omitted.)