The Role of CO2 Enhanced Oil Recovery in Ohio’s Economy and Energy Future

This report analyzes the Ohio-based industries and employment that might play a role in an Ohio market for exhaust-stream CO2 due to their participation in:

  • development and construction of CO2 pipelines and/or
  • injection of CO2 into producing oil wells or into underground geologic formations

A conceptual Ohio CO2 pipeline was developed and mapped to reflect planned CO2 sources and depleted oil fields that could be viable for EOR. This analysis shows that a 450-mile-long CO2 pipeline network had a construction cost estimate of $280 million.  Operating and Maintenance costs were estimated to be $2.3 million per year.  This conceptual pipeline system would run through 20 counties, linking four major oil field sinks with fifteen ethanol, synfuel and power plants as sources of CO2. Furthermore, CO2 pipeline and EOR activity in the state of Ohio would positively impact 13,000 establishments and 136,000 employees.  This represents 2.5 percent of all Ohio workers.  Cuyahoga, Franklin, and Hamilton counties would realize the most impact given the concentration of supply chain establishments within their borders.

Implications of the results found in this study are two-fold.  First, CO2 pipeline and EOR activity in the state of Ohio would have a widespread economic impact. Secondly, while the CO2 pipeline network displayed in this report is conceptual in nature, it is based upon linking formations suitable for EOR with likely sources of CO2.  The network could be phased in and constructed in conjunction with CO2 sources.  There are three advantages to constructing a CO2 pipeline network in Ohio.  First, EOR activity is feasible under current federal regulations and there are likely opportunities for positive cash flow to pay for pipeline construction.  Secondly, a built-out Ohio CO2 pipeline network can serve to link Ohio CO2 production to deep saline formation sinks in Ohio as well as EOR and sequestration sinks elsewhere in the nation.   Finally, as Ohio’s CO2 EOR rules are developed and the value of sequestered CO2 becomes known, Ohio producers of CO2 can begin to integrate various pipeline networks.