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Fossil fuels will remain an important part of domestic energy consumption into the 21st century. Availability of these fuels to provide clean, affordable energy is essential for the prosperity and security of the United States. However, there is a need to balance this security with growing concerns over global climate change linked to CO2 emissions.

Roughly one third of the United States' carbon emissions comes from power plants and other large point sources. To stabilize and ultimately reduce concentrations of this greenhouse gas, it is necessary to employ carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. CCS is the process by which CO2 is isolated from the emissions stream, compressed, and transported to an injection site where it is stored underground permanently. The U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy has made CCS a key element of its RD&D portfolio.

MORE INFO Program Overview: NETL's Carbon Sequestration Program Carbon Sequestration FAQ Information Portal

The Clean Coal Program is addressing the key challenges that confront the wide-scale deployment of CCS technologies through research on cost-effective capture technologies; monitoring, verification, and accounting technologies to ensure permanent storage; permitting issues; liability issues; public outreach; and infrastructure needs. As an example, today’s commercially available CCS technologies will add around 75 percent to the cost of electricity for a new pulverized coal plant, and around 35 percent to the cost of electricity for a new advanced gasification-based plant. The Program is aggressively pursuing developments to reduce these costs to less than a 10 percent increase in the cost of electricity for new gasification-based energy plants, and less than a 35 percent increase in the cost of electricity for pulverized coal energy plants.

Achieving a mid-point atmospheric CO2 concentration stabilization scenario would not require wholesale introduction of zero emission systems in the near term. This would allow time to develop cost effective technology over the next 10 years that could be deployed for new capacity as well as retrofitting existing capacity.

Modeling and assessments provide the capabilities to evaluate technology options in a total systems context (i.e., considering costs and impacts over the full product cycle). Further, the societal and environmental effects are analyzed to provide a basis for assessing trade-offs between local environmental impacts and global impacts. The DOE is collaborating with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to establish a regulatory framework for injection and geologic storage of CO2.

The program portfolio covers the entire carbon sequestration "life cycle" of capture, separation, transportation, and storage or reuse, as well as research needs for the two other major energy related greenhouse gases of concern, methane (CH4) and nitrous oxides (N2O). Specifically, the program has these elements:

• Cost effective CO2 capture and separation processes.
• CO2 sequestration in geological formations including oil and gas reservoirs, unmineable coal seams, and deep saline reservoirs.
• Improved full life-cycle carbon uptake of terrestrial ecosystems.
• Advanced chemical, biological, and decarbonization concepts.