Prinos oil field can capture 3 mln tons of CO2 a year
The Prinos oil field in northern Greece can capture 3 million tons of carbon dioxide a year, three times the amount envisaged in an initial study.
Energean will proceeding with studies on how to expand the field’s capture potential. This was decided at a meeting in Athens, where managers from Energean, EnEarth and Halliburton, one of the largest global advisers of energy firms.
Even at the original 1-million-ton level, there has been intense interest from domestic industries in carbon dioxide storage, with 10 memoranda of understanding, that is, nonbinding agreements, having been signed with 10 emitters.
Carbon capture appears to be a godsend for Greek firms, which have trouble reducing their emissions and were facing non-manageable costs, if the CO2 emission tax was further hiked, as expected. Greece releases about 33 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.
The Prinos project is the only geological CO2 capture project but, even expanded, does not meet the needs of the local industry. This has led HEREMA, the Hydrocarbons and Energy Resources Management Company, to seek disposal sites in countries such as Egypt and Italy, which have large exhausted oil and natural gas fields.
