U.S., Japan, Norway Sign First Kyoto Agreement; Will Jointly Sponsor Tests for Long-Term CO2 Disposal

Kyoto, Japan - The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), along with sister organizations in Japan and Norway, signed the first major research agreement on options for long-term carbon dioxide (CO2) disposal today in Kyoto, Japan.

Separately, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change opened in Kyoto on December 1. Approximately 150 nations are gather to negotiate the world's first binding international treaty to limit greenhouse gas emissions, consisten with the objective of the 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change.

The newly signed research agreement supports the objectives of the Framework Convention's Climate Change Initiative, Task Force 7, to evaluate long-term options to capture and dispose of greenhouse gas emissions and eventually to stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases.

CO2 is a greenhouse gas associated with the production and use of fossil fuels. The agreement partners the United States with Japan and Norway to participate in a field evaluation of deep water CO2 disposal, or sequestration, in the ocean. The field test will address the technical feasibility and the environmental impact of CO2 ocean sequestration, a process of pumping liquefied CO2 more than 3,000 feet below the ocean's surface through a series of pipes. Researchers anticipate the CO2 will remain in the deep ocean for several hundred years. Deep water sequestration potentially could be available to roughly 30 percent of U.S. power plants located throughout the coastal states.

Sequestration technology is a very promising approach to reducing CO2 in the atmosphere. This ocean sequestration project, along with the solicitation of research proposals for novel, low-cost sequestration technologies that U.S. Energy Secretary Federico Peña announced recently, represents a strong U.S. effort in this area.

"We have many technological tools to address pollution and climate concerns," Secretary Peña said as he announced the new climate change initiative at Carnegie Mellon University on September 15. "But to achieve our ultimate goal os stabilizing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases, we must also look to long-range concepts that can sequester or reuse carbon from industrial processes and fuel combustion gases. We want to look beyond what is currently feasible with today's technology."

Field tests of the ocean sequestration project are scheduled to begin in mid-1998. The partnership agreement is being signed by the Energy Department's Federal Energy Technology Center (FETC), a part of the Office of Fossil Energy; Japan's New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO); and the Research Council of Norway (NRC).

Implementing research organizations for the agreement are: the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for the United States; the Research Institute of Innovative Technology for the Earth and Pacific International Center for High Technology Research, for Japan; and the Norwegian Institute for Water Research, for Norway.

The project is estimated to run four-and-one-half years at an estimated cost of $3.8 million. The expected funding distribution is: NEDO (Japan): $2.6 million; the Office of Fossil Energy's FETC (United States): $850,000; and NRC (Norway): $350,000.

-End of Techline-

For more information, contact:
Hattie Wolfe, DOE Office of Fossil Energy, (202)586-6503, e-mail: hattie.wolfe@hq.doe.gov