Reports weigh carbon removal's prospects in Kern

May 30, 2023

Carbon capture and sequestration diverts CO2 emissions to underground storage.

A pair of reports released last week offered new insights into what it might take to successfully develop large-scale carbon dioxide removal projects in Kern County. Together they raise as much hope as hesitation not just for winning public support but also designing profitable investments.

A summary of community surveys found Bakersfield residents voiced the greatest support for CDR among respondents in four U.S. cities. But even as 75% of those surveyed locally indicated they believed a category known as direct-air capture would get community support, they said it would first have to demonstrate transparency, guarantee local jobs, use little water and run on renewable energy.

The other report, examining the financial viability of various industry-attached CDR projects in different parts of California, found some plainly made economic sense even as others did not. The least profitable was the only one researchers envisioned in Kern: a cement plant in the eastern part of the county capturing 900,000 tons of carbon dioxide per year.

They concluded the biggest problem would be the cost of sending captured CO2 by train to an injection site 60 miles away in the valley portion of Kern. Moving it by pipeline would slash transportation expenses, but the study's authors said decarbonizing California's important cement industry still might require incentives from state policies coming into consideration.

Co-author George Peridas, a scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the Bay Area, said a big lesson learned was that financial compensation to project operators may need to adjust according to a plant's profitability.

"The future of CCS (carbon capture and storage) and CDR in California hinges on finding ways to deploy projects that concurrently serve the climate, the project developer and the host of landowners and communities," Peridas said in a news release announcing the study. "A good-faith approach from all parties involved is required to enable such projects to materialize and succeed."

The reports have come as carbon management proposals draw interest along with concern. Oil producers, with the encouragement of policymakers, are moving forward with plans to capture and bury CO2, with a particular focus on Kern because of the county's capacity for injecting and storing the greenhouse gas in local geologic formations.

Environmental justice advocates worry CO2 could leak and suffocate disadvantaged communities living near pipelines or large industrial plants. Such hesitations were reflected in survey results published by Washington, D.C.-based Data for Progress, a progressive think tank and polling firm.

The group noted frustration among some Bakersfield residents who wondered why people living near industrial pollution seem always to be the first choice for new industrial projects.

In Houston, which was another place where Data for Progress gauged community attitudes by conducting in-person workshops, 71% of respondents indicated they thought their community would support direct air capture and storage of carbon dioxide. They said projects should include strong community participation with clear, enforceable benefits like affordable housing.

In Beaver County, Pennsylvania, only 47% indicated their community would strongly support a direct air capture hub. They suggested such a project promote its value as providing long-term, good-paying jobs, training programs and opportunities for young people.

In Rock Springs, Wyo. about half of the respondents predicted their community would support a DAC hub. It would have to bring new jobs as well as upgrades to the community's physical and social infrastructure, they suggested.

Nationally, it was reported that 68% of respondents "at least somewhat" supported building DAC hubs in the United States. Data for Progress said 77% of Democrats did, compared with 60% of Republicans and 65% of independents.

In Bakersfield, 20% of respondents said they would strongly support such a project, 55% said they somewhat support it and 5% said they are at least somewhat opposed.

A little more than one in five in Bakersfield indicated they didn't know enough about it to say either way.

The survey organization provided a few anonymous statements from people who participated in the Bakersfield workshop:

• "I feel this is something that is long overdue. We really need to think about the air or we won't have an Earth inhabited by us."

• "Why is (industrial project siting) always in poor areas? We’re always the ones to be experimented on."

• "We can't keep the status quo. We’ve had Aera Energy, Occidental, Chevron who’ve known about the problem. Now that the federal government is unloading all this money, now they want to participate?"

• "We shouldn't get the brunt of the burden without getting the job benefits."

The separate, Livermore Lab Foundation-funded comparison of carbon dioxide removal projects determined a pair of refinery projects — a Bay Area refinery and an ethanol plant in Stockton — would make the best financial case. It found that a CDR-equipped natural gas-fired plant in Tracy would lose money but not as much as a carbon dioxide-capturing cement plant in Mojave or Tehachapi.

The study's authors noted the cement plant would not benefit financially from California's Low Carbon Fuel Standard, as it does not produce fuel. That leaves it without a key state incentive for decarbonizing a major greenhouse gas producer in a state that uses and makes a lot of cement.

Lawmakers have called for the California Air Resources Board to put in place a strategy for pushing the state's cement sector to cut its emissions, according to the study.

"This means that additional incentives for carbon capture cement will likely be available in the future," the study states.

Business editor John Cox can be reached by phone at 661-395-7404

Western Kern has landed another significant carbon dioxide storage deal with a company from the Northwest proposing to gasify ag waste and tur…

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