Early operational experience at a one-million tonne CCS demonstration project, Decatur, Illinois, USA

After four years of site-specific work, carbon dioxide (CO₂) injection began at the Illinois Basin Decatur Project (IBDP) in Decatur, Illinois USA on 17 November 2011. The IBDP is a demonstration project in one of the Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnerships (Phase III) funded by the US Department of Energy. Work at IBDP was preceded by two years of regional basin studies and identification of a CO₂ source located optimally with respect to a major saline reservoir, the Mount Simon Sandstone, believed capable of safely and effectively containing gigatonne-scale quantities of sequestered CO₂ in the Illinois Basin of Illinois, southwestern Indiana, and western Kentucky, USA. Early operational experience has been a function of reservoir properties and the infrastructure f put in place to demonstrate carbon capture and storage (CCS). Development of the site included construction of a compression/dehydration facility and a 1.9 km pipeline, drilling of three wells, and development of a real-time data collection system to monitor operational parameters. As of 11 October 2012, 288,000 tonnes of dense-phase (supercritical) CO₂ have been injected, and injection continues at a rate of 1,000 tonnes per day.