Federal Stimulus Goes to University of Utah Carbon Sequestration Project

10.05.2009 by Elizabeth Ziegler

(KCPW News) University of Utah researcher Brian McPherson is competing for part of $1.4 billion in federal stimulus money to create one of the nation’s first commercial-scale carbon capture and sequestration projects. The U.S. Department of Energy has initially awarded him $2.7 million to submit a proposal, which he has seven months to complete.

“Hold onto your hat,” McPherson says, “because we’re going to be really busy for the next seven months, $2.7 million may seem like a lot, but it’s a lot of work to be done over the next seven months.”

McPherson is a USTAR researcher at the U’s Energy and Geoscience Institute.  He’s been working for the past seven years to test the viability of carbon capture technology, which traps carbon emissions from industrial smokestacks and injects it underground. McPherson says this is just one of the technologies that could play an important role in the nation’s energy future. But if it works, he says it could be implemented almost immediately.

“Everything we’re doing is about determining whether these projects are practical, economically feasible and safe,” McPherson says. “And if we can take on these big projects and demonstrate whether or not that’s the case, then we can get the country closer to meeting that broader portfolio.”

The new project would capture more than a million tons of carbon dioxide from industrial sources in Kansas, compress it and pipe it to a location where it would be injected underground for long-term storage, and to enhance oil drilling.  McPherson’s team is one of 12 selected to compete for federal funding to implement their proposal.