Welltec to test casing pipes for North Sea carbon capture project

Offshore staff

ESBJERG, Denmark — Welltec has started testing work to identify optimal materials for Project Greensand, a planned CO₂ store in the subsurface of the Danish North Sea.

The project could store up to 1.5 MMt per year of CO₂ by year-end 2025 and up to 8 Mt per year by 2030. Project Greensand is a consortium of 23 Danish and international partners.

One of the members is Welltec, which is providing its new 18-m by 5-m test flowloop for corrosion testing to compare the performance of five different materials in a controlled environment.

“We recreate the subsea environment of the North Sea and expose the materials to that environment for a long period, so we find out which materials are best suited to function over time,” said Linda Nolting Kristensen, technology innovation lead at Welltec.

The company has designed two test phases. In the first, results from tests on the five different materials will form the basis for further qualification later in the project.

Ultimately, the findings will support the recommendation of which materials Project Greensand should proceed with for the casing pipes, which will run down to the sandstone reservoir, 1,800 m beneath the seabed.

Project Greensand also involves specially designed pump systems transporting the CO₂ to the sandstone reservoir.

“It is crucial for us that we select the right materials for the dedicated CO₂ injection wells for Project Greensand, so in the future we can store CO₂ safely in the Danish subsea,” said Søren Reinhold Poulsen, project director for Project Greensand.

In connection with the pilot project for CO₂ injection, Project Greensand expects to test the first storage of CO₂ in the subsurface of the North Sea around the end of this year.

09.01.2022