SA gets carbon storage atlas
2010-09-10 20:41
Pretoria - South Africa has its first atlas on the geological storage of carbon dioxide in the continent as part of a global effort to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.
After the launch, the National Centre for Carbon Capture and Storage said: "The atlas provides an overview of the country’s energy economy, a roadmap on carbon capture and storage and the progress made to date in this regard.
"...This represents the first major milestone in identifying potential storage sites in South Africa," said spokesperson Tony Surridge.
The production of the atlas, described as a ground-breaking endeavour, was the result of co-operation between the government, state-owned entities and the private sector.
The environment affairs department in 2007 released a long-term mitigation scenarios report, which described a number of actions that had to be undertaken to decrease national carbon dioxide emissions between now and 2050.
Included in these alternative interventions was the use of carbon capture and storage technologies.
Surridge said carbon capture and storage was usually done by injecting carbon dioxide into deep geological formations where it should remain securely stored.
"While this atlas is aimed at providing easily accessible information to decision-makers, a detailed technical report is also available for use by specialists as a basis for future work in this important area," he said.
- SAPA