A Case Study of Monitoring Emission from CO2 Enhanced Oil Recovery by Remote Sensing Data

Abstract

Enhanced oil recovery with carbon dioxide (CO 2 -EOR) is considered to be a cost effective way for carbon capture and storage. However, due to the complexity of geological structure in underground reservoirs, long-term leakage is possible. A case study of CO 2 -EOR has been conducted at Citronelle, Alabama in the United State of America. A total of 8,036-ton of CO 2 were injected from November 2009 to September 2010 and some leakages via production were identified by isotopic analysis in May 2010. In this study, remote sensing data of CO 2 and methane (CH 4 ) concentrations, and aerosol optical depth (AOD) at a large scale were used to monitor emissions to atmosphere at the study site. Based on the observed monthly CO 2 and CH 4 concentrations in the atmosphere at the study site and surrounding areas, some abnormal values related to possible emission were identified at different time scales by correlation, variance and entropy analysis. The annual average of ratios between CO 2 concentration and CH 4 concentration, which might be due to CO 2 emission, reached the highest value in 2009. In comparison with surrounding areas, the monthly values of AOD at the study site were relatively higher, especially during the time periods of 2008, 2009 and part of 2010. Our results might confirm the isotopic analysis at the ground and may provide more detailed information. Therefore, through this approach remote sensing data could be used to monitor and evaluate emissions from areas involved in CO 2 -EOR at a large scale and provide helpful information for ecological assessment of CO 2 -EOR.

A case study using remote sensing data to compare biophysical properties of a forest and an urban area in Northern Alabama, USA

“…Although forests are significant carbon sinks, this study found the atmospheric CO 2 concentrations were very similar in both sites. The same approach was applied to detect possible CO 2 emissions from a geological carbon storage site in southern Alabama (Chen, 2014). The possible causes for these results include: (a) for a small city like Huntsville, CO 2 and CH 4 emissions at the study area may be not significant, or air circulation occurs quickly; (b) the urban green land (grass and trees) in Huntsville absorbed some of the CO 2 or CH 4 emissions, as there was still 40% vegetation cover in the urban study area; and (c) higher resolution data (both space and time) of CO 2 and CH 4 concentrations are not available at the current time, which may return very different results.…”

The Technique Analysis of CO2 in Troposphere using AIRS

“…The high-resolution Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) was launched into Earth-orbit in May 2002, with the goal to support climate research and improve weather forecasting. AIRS uses cutting-edge infrared technology and provides information related to air temperature, water vapor, trace gases and cloud property (e.g., Pagano et al, 2003;Chahine, Barnet, Olsen, Chen, & Maddy, 2006) (Chen, 2014).…”