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The transboundary transportation of carbon dioxide (CO2) gives rise to international legal issues not faced in other standalone carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects or domestic projects. While the European Union CCS Directive establishes a framework for CCS, it does not address specifically the issue of transboundary transportation. This will require participating Member States to agree a statutory framework for CO2 transport, which addresses issues at the international, national and local levels of law. This paper considers several key issues for developing and resolving legal issues around ownership and risk for CO2 transportation, an area with limited research literature to date. The legal challenges are examined using a ‘pilot’ project to explore and highlight specific examples. The research draws from a series of CCS industry stakeholder meetings and analysis was developed through interdisciplinary perspectives. In addition, the potential partnership arrangements are explored from a law and policy perspective with an examination of the key issues for these partnerships for Member States. Finally, this research presents a timeline for a legal strategy on resolving the issues for risk and ownership for CO2 transport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research is a legal analysis concerning four scenarios for cross-border carbon dioxide (CO2) transport that could increase the deployment of carbon-capture and storage (CCS) deployment in Europe. The legal analysis categorizes the law into three levels--international, national and local--and considers the four scenarios in light of these three levels of energy law. Upon reviewing the four scenarios, it is clear that the Rotterdam Nucleus (referred to as the 'Pilot Case') is the leading scenario and as a result it is explored in more detail. The potential Pilot Case is based on the development of Rotterdam (in the Netherlands) as a southern North Sea hub. Under this Rotterdam Nucleus scenario, captured CO2 will be transported through the Port of Rotterdam to depleted gas fields offshore the Netherlands. CO2 will also be transported through further links using CCS infrastructure to facilitate the processing of undeveloped gas fields offshore UK. The Pilot case contemplates further expansion opportunities, increasing the capture clusters through additional pipelines, expanding to further gas fields and using the port of Rotterdam for CO2 shipping--hence the analysis of the other scenarios may be invaluable in the future development of CO2 networks in the EU. Finally, and an original contribution of this article is that it employs the three lawyers of energy law theoretical framework to an energy problem that was examined by an interdisciplinary research team. Furthermore, this research was developed further through two key industry stakeholder meetings with CCS experts in the EU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We used a sub-salt Rotliegend Group sandstone saline aquifer in the North Sea as a case study site for Monte-Carlo-based CO2 geostorage capacity assessment. In the area of interest, this unit is characterized by sparse, low resolution, subsurface data typical of the margins of global petroleum provinces, favored for CO2 storage. Such data scarcity leads to uncertainty regarding the complex trap geometries and ultimate CO2 storage capacity. The Rotliegend reservoir, estimated to have porosity and permeability ranges of 11-27% and 0.2 mD-125 mD, respectively, is sealed by Zechstein salt. The salt, predominantly halite, is a proven hydrocarbon seal in the central and southern North Sea hosting oil and gas columns of >140 m (>450 ft) and >150 m (>500 ft). Utilizing 2D-seismic data, boreholes and analogues, we estimate the pore volume of a 5-km2 4-way dip-closed structure through Monte-Carlo-based capacity simulations. We estimated storage capacity using published methodologies and compared this against a theoretical total storage calculation analogous to the gas in place equation used in the petroleum industry. We found that different methods yield a capacity range of <104 to >109 tonnes CO2 where sensitivity analysis indicates variability in reservoir properties to be the dominant control. Thus static estimates based upon Monte-Carlo calculations present no advantage over theoretical pore volume estimations. This leaves 3D dynamic modeling of storage capacity populated by 3D seismic data and direct down-hole measurement of reservoir properties to improve confidence in capacity estimations as the recommended method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]