The Department of Energy has successfully pumped five million tons of carbon dioxide underground. The carbon dioxide is from a coal gasification plant in North Dakota and has been pumped underground to a Canadian oil field. This technology sounds very promising because it could significantly reduce CO2 emissions into our atmosphere while increasing the oil production of a given oil field.
When I heard about this successful test, I was very interested. This technology is highly suggested by Deffeyes in his book Beyond Oil. I hope to hear more about this technology in the future as it is implimented in more places. It seems to me a win-win situation for global warming and oil companies. The technology sounds like it could make a significant dent in our carbon dioxide emissions. The article I read states that if the process were used in all the oil fields of western Canada, “we would see billions of additional barrels of oil and a reduction of CO2 emissions equivalent to pulling more than 200 million cars off the road for a year.”
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The most memorable exam question in my college career involved crunching numbers on bacteria driven subterranean in WVa CO2 disposal for my Reactions course. It prompted a nice debate about whether it was ethical to disrupt that ecosystem. Prof. Morrison (did you meet him when we toured CWRU?) s final statement was along the lines of "We have to make choices, I'd rather disrupt a few caves than the air breathed by the majority this planets species."
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