North Dakota’s largest oil drill says it will set aside $ 250 million to fund a proposed pipeline that will collect carbon dioxide produced by ethanol plants in the Midwest and pump it underground for permanent storage
BISMARK, North Dakota – North Dakota’s largest oil well said Wednesday it would set aside $ 250 million to fund a proposed pipeline that will collect carbon dioxide from ethanol plants in the Midwest and pump it to thousands. feet underground for permanent storage.
Continental Resources, led by billionaire oil tycoon Harold Ham, has discussed a $ 4.5 billion investment in the Summit Carbon Solutions pipeline at an ethanol plant in Casselton, eastern North Dakota. The plant is one of 31 ethanol facilities in Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and Dakota, where emissions will be captured and taken to western North Dakota and buried deep underground.
The summit project is one of at least two major CO2 pipelines planned for the Midwest. Navigator CO2 Ventures is planning a 1,200-mile pipeline (1,931 kilometers) through Iowa, South Dakota, Nebraska, Minnesota and Illinois.
Similar plans for CO2 pipelines are being considered elsewhere, after the federal government increased tax credits by 2026 to $ 50 for every metric tonne of carbon dioxide the company captures. Ethanol manufacturers are working to make the fuel more marketable on the West Coast, and especially in California, which requires distributors in the state to buy only low-carbon ethanol; companies that produce such ethanol may get a higher price.
The Summit pipeline system will stretch 2,000 miles (3,219 kilometers) and can carry up to 12 million metric tons of carbon dioxide a year, said Wade Boeshans, executive vice president of the Iowa-based pipeline developer. That equates to eliminating the annual carbon emissions of 2.6 million cars, he said.
Boeshans said Hamm’s involvement is likely to help raise capital and improve the project’s profile. Hamm’s company helped drive the renaissance in the U.S. oil industry by using horizontal drilling to release oil trapped in shale rocks. Continental is the largest producer and largest tenant in the Bakken shale formation, with more than 1 million acres (404,686 hectares) in North Dakota and Montana.
Hamm told the Associated Press that his company sees the pipeline project as more than an investment.
“We feel it’s the right thing to do at the right time,” Hamm said. “Carbon capture and storage will become more important every day as we move forward in America.
North Dakota is the third largest oil producer in the country after Texas and New Mexico.
Representatives of Continental and Summit said there were no plans to inject carbon dioxide into old oil wells to increase production, a process that has largely failed in North Dakota.
“It’s not part of our business plan,” Boeshans said.
North Dakota’s underground rock formations are ideal for storing carbon, said state geologist Ed Murphy.
In 2018, the Trump administration gave North Dakota the power to regulate underground wells used for long-term storage of waste carbon dioxide. North Dakota was the first state to be given such powers, the Environmental Protection Agency said in a statement. Since then, the state has invested heavily in carbon capture and sequestration technology.
North Dakota Republican Gov. Doug Burgham praised the pipeline summit and other proposed carbon storage projects in North Dakota that are an integral part of the state’s plan to become carbon neutral by 2030.
Boeshans said the company began negotiations with landowners over the easement pipeline in December, although the company will not rule out the use of a prominent domain if agreements with landowners cannot be reached voluntarily.
“Overall, we are making progress with voluntary easements,” he said.
The company has not applied for permits in North Dakota for the pipeline or approximately a dozen underground wells needed for storage. The project could employ up to 17,000 people during construction and lead to 500 permanent jobs when it is expected to be online in mid-2024, Boeshans said.