Environmental scan and issue awareness: risk management challenges for CCS

Abstract

Long lists of issues relevant to carbon capture and storage projects have been provided in a number of sources, encompassing the broad categories of technological risks, health and environmental risks and societal risks. From these long lists a selection of ten major issues, broken down into three broad categories, has been made. The selected issues are: 1) government and industry factors (competent regulatory oversight; adequate risk assessment and risk management frameworks; and supportive public policy architecture); 2) environmental risk factors (adequate site-specific characterisations of geological formations for CCS storage sites worldwide; credible monitoring of storage site performance; and the possibility of leaking from storage); 3) socioeconomic factors (tolerable economic costs; public perceptions of risks and benefits; information provision, effective communication and stakeholder engagement; and social and public acceptability, including the use of decision support mechanisms). The paper emphasises that what is unique about carbon capture and storage, considered as a major set of risk issues of global proportions, is how proactively these relevant major risks and risk factors have been identified and characterised by major institutional actors, especially industry and governments.

The economic evaluation of the benefits and costs of carbon capture and storage

“…Nykvist (2013) identified four main challenges that are greater than presently thought in moving beyond the current demonstration stage:  tenfold scaling-up in size from pilot plants to commercial demonstration projects  tenfold increase in the number of constructed large-scale demonstration plants  tenfold increase in annual funding needed for the next 40 years  tenfold increase in the price of CO 2 emissions. Herzog (2011) also pointed to the integration and scaling up of CCS components as the main challenge to commercial deployment of the technology while Leiss and Krewski (2018) identify three broad categories of issues: "Government and industry factors (competent regulatory oversight; adequate risk assessment and risk management frameworks; and supportive public policy architecture); (2) Environmental risk factors (adequate site-specific characterisations of geological formations for CCS storage sites worldwide; credible monitoring of storage site performance; and the possibility of leaking from storage); and (3) Socio-economic factors (tolerable economic costs; public perceptions of risks and benefits; information provision, effective communication and stakeholder engagement; and social and public acceptability, including the use of decision support mechanisms). "…”

“…Strong political support is needed for a large scale deployment, such as strategic storage validation and pipeline planning and a clear process to make commercial CCS attractive to potential investors. Alphen et al (2009) and Leiss and Krewski (2018) also point to the need of direct policy initiatives to encourage entrepreneurial activity and market formation for a continued strong innovation system.…”

“…CCS deployment will continue to meet barriers pertaining to the technology itself, government policies and competition from other technologies. Some of these barriers were identified by Davies et al (2013) using an opinion survey completed by 229 CCS experts, including cost and cost recovery, lack of financial incentive or a price signal, long-term liability risks and lack of comprehensive regulatory frame (see also Larkin et al, 2018dLeiss and Krewski, 2018).…”

Risk assessment and management frameworks for carbon capture and geological storage: a global perspective

“…Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a technological process that could reduce industrial point source greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change (IEA, 2009(IEA, , 2013(IEA, , 2016IPCC, 2005IPCC, , 2014. In order to promote its uptake worldwide, stakeholders have repeatedly identified the need for a legal and regulatory framework within international, regional, national and sub-national jurisdictions (Baker and McKenzie, 2011;Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum, 2013;CO 2 Capture Project, 2010Condor et al, 2011a;GCCSI, 2010GCCSI, , 2013GCCSI, , 2014IEA, 2009IEA, , 2010aIEA, , 2010bIEA, , 2011IEA, , 2013IEA, , 2018Keith et al, 2005;Klass and Wilson, 2008;Leiss and Krewski, 2019;Pollak and Wilson, 2009;US Environmental Protection Agency, 2010;Wilson et al, 2003). Issues include carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) ownership, liability, emission credits and project funding; health and environmental protection; public engagement; monitoring; and provisions specific to cross-border contexts.…”

An integrated risk assessment and management framework for carbon capture and storage: a Canadian perspective

“…Articles in this Special Issue consider wide ranging risk assessment and management issues relevant to future CCS implementation. In introducing these issues, Leiss and Krewski (2019) identify ten major factors within three broad categories ( Table 1). The key finding is that major risk issues have been proactively identified and characterised by industry, government and non-government organisations.…”