With 40 registered participants and over 60 people giving their time and resources to attend and contribute with outstanding work and that made our session a total success.

We had Georges Beaudoin (Université Laval) as a keynote speaker, talking about Passive Carbon Mineralization of Ultramafic Mine Waste by Atmospheric CO_2. And Rona Donahoe taking about: Mitigating Environmental Impacts of CO₂ Through Mineralization Using FGD Gypsum.

Nina Zeyen (University of Alberta) and Connor Turvey (University of British Columbia) co-chaired the first session. Martin Voigt (University of Iceland – Carbfix) and Catalina Sanchez Roa (University College London – S4CE) co-chaired the second session. It was challenging with 3-minutes per person scheduled by the organisers but the conveners managed to tell the participants about their work: the virtual Goldschmidt conference was a success!

The session

Mitigating Environmental Impacts: Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS) and Novel Approaches in the Geo-Energy Sector

Carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) is one of the proposed key mitigation strategies to limit global warming to below 1.5 ℃. Multiple techniques are being developed, including injection into old fossil fuel reservoirs, creation of biofuels and mineral carbonation, where weathering of igneous rocks and carbonate precipitation are accelerated to store CO₂ in the form of environmentally benign and stable carbonate minerals. Geochemical, biological and physical processes are critical in many aspects of CCUS, including 1) assessment of mineral carbonation potential, reservoir permeabilities and possible migration pathways, 2) development of innovative CO₂ capture methods from air, water, or biology, such as direct injection, enhanced weathering and biomineralization, 3) monitoring CO₂-fluid-rock interactions and mineralization in the subsurface. Similarly, geo-energy exploitation requires reliable geochemical tools to assess subsurface fluid transport and interaction with reservoir rocks, well casings and microbiology. Before mobilizing resources, energy and time in the implementation of these new technologies numerical models are used to evaluate risks and impacts. These numerical models present challenges in themselves as oftentimes they can have only a tenuous relationship with reality. This session will explore scientific advances and innovations relating to carbon capture, utilisation and storage, including mineral carbonation, as well as the mitigation of environmental impacts relating to geothermal energy, enhanced oil and gas recovery, and unconventional geo-energy applications in general. We invite contributions focusing on laboratory and in situ experimental work, analogue tests, field observations and trials, reaction path and transport simulations, covering geochemical and/or biological approaches, in-situ monitoring technologies, and environmental impact studies around terrestrial and marine geological CO₂ storage and other mitigation strategies.”

The full programme on the Goldschmidt website

The S4CE abstracts: