“Bury carbon in abandoned mines” - Carbonco signs a MOU with Samcheok City.
DATE 2024.11.22
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"Bury carbon in abandoned mines" - Carbonco signs a MOU with Samcheok City.
(from left) Hyun Shin Ko, CTO of Carbonco, In Seong Cho, director of Economic Promotion Bureau at Samcheok City,
Geon Woo Han, director of Low-Carbon CCUS Research Center at POSCO Holdings, Jin Soo Lee,
director of Technology Research Institute at KOMIR, and Sang Min Kim, head of New Business Division at Techcross Environmental Services Inc. poses for a commemorative photo after signing an MOU for a pilot project to store carbon dioxide
on land using abandoned mines on the 21st.
Geon Woo Han, director of Low-Carbon CCUS Research Center at POSCO Holdings, Jin Soo Lee,
director of Technology Research Institute at KOMIR, and Sang Min Kim, head of New Business Division at Techcross Environmental Services Inc. poses for a commemorative photo after signing an MOU for a pilot project to store carbon dioxide
on land using abandoned mines on the 21st.
- Captured carbon will be solidified and then buried – Abandoned mined will be used as ‘carbon storage’.
- Push forward the commercial-scale demonstration project by 2027, offering a solution to “storage shortage’
Carbonco, a DL E&C’s subsidiary specializing in CCUS (Carbon Capture, Utilization and Storage) technology, announced that it will participate in a national project consortium to convert the abandoned mines into ‘carbon dioxide storage’ facilities. This is the first time a domestic company gets into a project for developing the onshore carbon storage.
The consortium consisting of Carbonco, POSCO Holdings, a water treatment specialist Techcross Environmental Services Inc., and Korea Mine Rehabilitation and Mineral Resources Corporation (“KOMIR”) announced on the 22nd that it signed a MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) with Samcheok City on November 22 for a pilot project to store carbon dioxide on land using abandoned mines. This pilot project, supported by a total government budget of KRW6.76 billion, will be carried out from this year to 2027. The consortium was selected as the pilot project implementer. It will start developing and demonstrating technology to utilize abandoned mines as storage for capturing carbon dioxide.
The first step is to convert the ‘gaseous’ carbon dioxide into a ‘solid’ form. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is captured from the exhaust gas coming from chimney of steel mills, and then mixed with slag (a byproduct obtained from the steelmaking process). Carbon dioxide reacts with the primary components of slag, including calcium (Ca) and magnesium (Mg), and then changes into hard solids, such as calcium carbonate (CaCO3) and magnesium carbonate (MgCO3). This is called ‘mineral carbonation’.
The solid mass produced in this way is buried in an abandoned mine, which is the ‘storage’ stage. The target site for this project is an abandoned mine located in Samcheok-si, Gangwon-do. According to KOMIR, there are currently 5115 abandoned mines in Korea, but it is not easy to rehabilitate them. The consortium plans to capture 3 tons of carbon dioxide per day by 2027 to produce 300 tons of filler for abandoned mines. The consortium and Samcheok City have agreed to make a plan for providing specific institutional support, such as permit and approval for storage and utilization of carbon dioxide.
In this project, Carbonco plays a role in verifying technology for onshore storage of carbon dioxide and reviewing business model for commercialization. Since the 2010s, Carbonco has participated in a project to capture and store up to 80,000 tons of carbon dioxide per year, that generated from the Boryeong Thermal Power Plant, and developed a business model for capturing and storing carbon dioxide in offshore gas fields with a state-run power company in Indonesia. It is believed that Carbonco will be able to utilize its experience and capabilities accumulated from this construction of COs capture facility.
In 2021, Korea announced its ‘NDC’ (Nationally Determined Contribution) to reduce COs emissions by 290 million tons by 2030. Therefore, large-scale COs storage is essential to achieving this goal. Even if the current demonstration project for Donghae gas field storage is successful, the amount of carbon dioxide stored in 2030 will be only 1.2 million tons. This is why onshore storage using abandoned mines is considered as the most realistic alternative. It is also evaluated as eco-friendly in terms of recycling industrial byproducts.
Sang Min Lee, CEO of Carbonco, said, “In a domestic environment where carbon dioxide storage is scarce, this pilot project using abandoned mines and mineral carbonation technology will be a critical alternative. We, as a company specialized in CCUS technology, will successfully complete this pilot project to lay the foundation for activating the domestic CCUS market.”
