HOW CARBON CAPTURE AND STORAGE WORKS

Last year, the Carbon Capture and Storage plant at SaskPower’s Boundary Dam removed 800,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) created by generating electricity from coal.

That’s about the same amount of CO2 that would be produced by almost 350,000 cars in Canada.

The extraction process works by exposing flue gases to amine, a derivative of ammonia. Carbon dioxide clings to the amine, which is piped away and heated, which causes the CO2 to separate from amine.

The amine is returned to the processor while the CO2 gas is liquefied and piped to Cenovus Energy’s Weyburn/ Midale oilfield. There, the CO2 is injected under pressure into oil formations more than a kilometre below the surface, where it acts as a solvent to remove oil stuck underground.

The freed oil is removed but the carbon dioxide remains trapped underground.