Britain plans to turn old oil wells into carbon dioxide dumps 
The UK has decided to use old oil and gas wells as carbon dioxide dumps. Such an unexpected application for oil and gas facilities was found within the framework of a project of a consortium of energy companies and universities of the country, writes The Guardian.
The Universities of Newcastle, Durham and Oxford, as well as energy companies IGAS and Third Energy are participating in the Net Zero Rise research project. … They plan to turn decommissioned oil and gas wells into underground carbon stores and test whether they can contain harmful emissions as part of the fight against climate change on the planet. The study authors intend to test hundreds of onshore wells in Britain in 2022.
It is assumed that one well can store a relatively small amount of carbon dioxide (about 1000 tons) at a depth of one to three kilometers. The cost of re-profiling one well and installing monitoring equipment will be approximately £ 5 million (approximately $ 6.63 million). “If we do not do this soon, we will lose the ability to use this infrastructure. Drilling [new] wells is an expensive undertaking that adds a certain amount of risk, “said one of the project leaders, professor at the University of Newcastle, Richard Davis.
According to the British consortium, the reuse of existing onshore oil and gas wells is the fastest and cheapest way to research and develop safe and efficient storage systems. In turn, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the British Climate Change Committee (CCC) have confirmed that capturing and storing carbon dioxide will be an important part of the fight against the climate crisis on the planet. In this regard, the IPCC proposed testing wells under the North Sea as potential reservoirs. It is this place that is considered the most efficient for storing carbon.
Similar tests for the disposal of carbon dioxide are already underway in the United States, Canada and Australia. However, Davis is confident that terrestrial facilities in the UK will perform better due to the nature of the soil.
The UK government's strategy for achieving zero emissions is to capture and store 50 million tons of carbon dioxide by the mid-2030s. However, the Climate Change Committee has previously called on the UK to develop a concrete action plan to tackle global warming. In particular, the government needs a clear plan to reduce harmful emissions from agriculture, which account for ten percent of total UK emissions. Additionally, gaps in the policy of adapting the daily behavior of citizens need to be closed.