Targeting Net Zero in Offshore Production: A Conceptual Review of Offshore Carbon Capture and Reuse

The world global warming requires a strong transition commitment to a decarbonized energy system. This means more efficiency in power utilization, recycling and reuse of materials, increase of renewable power generation and development of technologies able to reduce the carbon footprint.

In particular, Companies and Contractors of the energy sector are nowadays forced to reassess their knowledges and capabilities in order to face the challenges posed by such new scenario.

The repurposing of offshore oil & gas aged assets for carbon capture is an important part of it. Additionally, the findings of this work will surely impact the future design of the new greener facilities. To cope with the above-mentioned contents, the technologies for Carbon Capture from flue gas in an operating facility and Direct Capture from air have been evaluated through an engineering R&D activity performed during 2021 and 2022, with the purpose of assessing their maturity and the opportunity of their deployment in the offshore environment.

Following the State of Art, Market Investigation and Technology Assessment for the two mentioned ways of capture, the Conceptual Designs of Carbon Capture from flue gas and directly from air have been performed. The design activity includes the comprehensive steps necessary to obtain a CO₂-rich stream adequate for the export (i.e., compression, oxygen removal and dehydration).

Safety aspects have a remarkable importance: the capture modules were designed in compliance with international codes and standards, particularly for the provisions and designs of safety and loss prevention systems. Some highlights from the safety and regulatory framework investigations are therefore provided.

The work is then complemented by the state of art for a safe and permanent offshore carbon storage and a preliminary CO₂ re-use/valorization overview from the point of view of hypothetical offshore applications.

The work presented in the paper set the basis for the offshore deployment of technologies initially conceived for onshore applications, able to guarantee the carbon neutrality of existing and future installations in marine environment or even helping the world to become carbon negative by exploiting existing offshore facilities.