(Enhance Energy Youtube video)

By Troy Gillard

underground reservoirs near clive

Massive carbon capture project finally opens in Alberta

Jun 2, 2020 | 3:49 PM

More than a decade later, a project designed to trap greenhouse gases while also boosting the oil industry in central Alberta is finally open.

It was in 2009 when the Alberta Carbon Trunk Line (ACTL) was promised $63 million from the federal government under then-prime minister Stephen Harper and $495 million from the provincial government under former Progressive Conservative premier Ed Stelmach. The project was to startup three years later but faced several delays, including one resulting from the oil price crash of 2014.

The $1.2 billion project captures CO₂ from two Edmonton-area industrial sites and ships it 240 kilometres south to an oilfield near Clive through what’s billed as the world’s largest capacity pipeline for CO₂ from human activity.

The ACTL is said to be capable of transporting up to 14.6 million tonnes of CO₂ per year – equal to capturing the CO₂ from more than 2.6 million cars in Alberta. Officials with the project say its capacity represents about 20 per cent of all current oilsands emissions.

The project is operated by a consortium of companies including Wolf Midstream and Enhance Energy.

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“This is just the beginning,” said Jeff Pearson, President of Wolf Midstream’s Carbon Business Unit. “This critical piece of infrastructure supports significant future emissions solutions, new utilization pathways and innovation in the carbon capture space. The future of energy and a lower carbon economy relies on key infrastructure like the ACTL.”

Officials say the system is designed to be expandable to connect more facilities and storage reservoirs in the future as demand increases for an effective solution to manage emissions.

“We are putting CO₂to use. We permanently keep CO₂ out of the environment, while producing low-carbon energy,” says Enhance Energy CEO Kevin Jabusch. “Not only are we reinvigorating our rural energy economy at a time when it is needed most, but we are playing a key role in advancing a sustainable solution to global energy requirements.”