Brazil's state-controlled Petrobras' carbon capture network in the Santos basin pre-salt is the world's largest, with around 7mn metric tonnes/yr of CO2 being pumped back into deepwater reservoirs, the company said.
CO2 reinjection at nine platforms at three Santos basin fields — Sapinhoa, Tupi and Mero — account for around 19pc of the 36.6mn t/yr of carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) programs operating as of September 2021, according to a recent report from the Global CCS Institute.
Petrobras told Argus that 13 of the 15 floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) units scheduled to come on stream through 2026 will be equipped with the same water alternating gas (WAG) reinjection technology that is leading its CCUS strategy.
The company will spend around $2.8bn of the $68bn earmarked for 2022-26 spending on scope 1, 2, and 3 decarbonization, renewable fuels and research and development targets. Upstream, the firm plans to halt routine flaring by 2030 and intends to reduce carbon intensity by 32pc, reduce methane emissions by 40pc, and reach cumulative CO2 reinjection of 40mn t by 2025.
Petrobras has reinjected 28.1mn t of CO2 between the 2008 deployment of the pioneer reinjection system and the end of the third quarter 2021. The company reinjected around 6.7mn t of CO2 in the first nine months of 2021, the company said.
"The objective is to reduce emissions and, at the same time, increase the efficiency of oil recovery from deposits, due to the particular characteristics of the interaction of the injected CO2 with the rock and fluids present in the reservoir," the company said.
Petrobras' upstream emissions reduction plans are also based on the future deployment of a patented high pressure subsea CO2 separation technology known as HISEP. The technology is expected to first be deployed at the Mero pre-salt field aboard a 180,000 b/d FPSO earmarked for 2024.
Executives say HISEP could help make other pre-salt fields with high levels of corrosive CO2 economically viable.
