Energy Ministry: Geological formations could store 10 million tons of CO₂ annually

The Energy Ministry has identified geological formations capable of holding 10 million tons of carbon dioxide a year and kickstarting a carbon storage industry worth an annual estimated NIS 1 billion ($275 million), officials said.

Ten million tons of CO₂ is equivalent to 17 percent of the country’s annual carbon emissions, the officials said at a conference held at the Geological Survey in Jerusalem on Tuesday.

Storing it deep underground for a long time could help the country reach net zero, officials said. This is when carbon dioxide that enters the atmosphere is balanced by the amount that is removed.

Chen Bar Yosef, director of the Energy Ministry’s Natural Resources Administration, said CCS (carbon capture and storage, or  “sequestration”) was a “technology that the world already recognizes as complementary to the introduction of clean energies and energy efficiency, and it must be in our toolbox in the effort to reach net zero emissions toward 2050.”

He added that it could help Israeli industry maintain a competitive edge, as overseas markets such as the EU increasingly demand evidence of a country or company’s moves toward achieving net zero.

In a draft policy document on reaching net zero by 2050 that was issued for public comment earlier this year (in Hebrew), the Energy Ministry presented three approaches in principle to reaching the optimal power mix for the future:  one relying mainly on solar energy with carbon capture and storage or reuse in industry (CCUS); a second one combining solar energy with hydrogen; and a third combining solar energy with hydrogen and nuclear energy.

The Energy Ministry has been working on carbon capture and storage with the finance, environmental protection, and economy and industry ministries, the Planning Authority, Water Authority, businesses and NGOs, many of which were represented at Tuesday’s confab.

The Geological Survey carried out the geological mapping on which the Energy Ministry’s figures are based.

The ministry even presented a draft amendment to the Mining Ordinance to start a process of regulation.

But the way ahead is long.

So-called anthropogenic (human-caused) emissions of gases such as CO₂ and methane are helping to drive climate change by creating a blanket that prevents the sun’s heat from escaping. Key drivers of emissions are burning fossil fuels.

Nature-based solutions to take CO₂ out of the atmosphere currently make up the bulk of carbon removal projects, taking a leaf from nature’s own book. These include restoring habitats, such as forests and wetlands, that naturally absorb CO₂.

In carbon capture and storage (CCS) or carbon capture, use and storage (CCUS), carbon dioxide is captured from industrial sources, such as chimneys, power plants or gas platforms, separated and treated, and then either recycled into new products (such as carbonated drinks, or chemicals) or stored long-term, underground, in a compressed, liquid-like form. According to the Global CCS Institute, over 200 million metric ton of human-generated CO₂ has already been injected underground.

One of the key remaining challenges for humankind is how to capture carbon dioxide that’s already in the atmosphere.

The past 10 years have been the warmest on record, with 2024 set to be the hottest yet.

This year, global average temperatures are expected to breach the limit of 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels, beyond which the 2015 Paris Accords said the mercury should not rise.

While the United Nations says emissions must be cut by 43% by 2030 and 60% by 2035 (compared to 2019 levels) if the world is to remain within the 1.5 degree Celsius orbit this century, emissions are only increasing.

Climate experts warn that capturing carbon, either from the atmosphere or from industrial infrastructure such as chimneys, must not be seen as a substitute for emissions cuts and energy saving.

But they see it as an essential part of the battle to reach net zero, which uses the removal and long-term storage of carbon mainly to offset emissions that are hard to reduce, for example in the steel industry.

At a carbon conference earlier this month organized by ClimateNet, KVS, and 2B-Friendly, Ilan Nissim, a senior official at the Energy Ministry, said that carbon capture, utilization and storage constituted “the most available and efficient technology for reducing emissions” and that work on regulations to make CCUS possible would be undertaken in the coming year.

He revealed that Geological Survey had located space in saline aquifers in southern Israel’s Negev Desert for the long-term burial of a total of seven to 15 gigatons (15 billion metric tons) of captured carbon. Additional room would be available offshore, he said, in geological formations and used-up natural gas reservoirs.

Asked to explain the two figures, an Energy Ministry spokesperson said these were “preliminary assessments” upon which the ministry was still working. It was also examining available technologies.

He said over 10 different underground structures had been identified  during an initial phase of inquiries and that a detailed feasibility study would be conducted “in the coming years.”

Maya Jacobs, co-founder and CEO of Climate Net, welcomed the government’s focus on carbon removal, but wondered where the economic incentives would come from to propel industry to explore explore carbon storage.

Such an incentive would not come from a recently introduced carbon tax, she said. This primarily affects regular citizens, via higher prices at the gasoline pump, rather than industry, which will receive six years of state subsidies to adapt to the new tax.

She said it was important that the government take a broader view and map all the ways to reduce carbon emissions in electricity, but also in  agriculture, construction, waste treatment, and more.