Early in 1999, KeySpan Energy Canada (KeySpan) began planning an acid gas injection scheme at its Brazeau River Sour Gas Plant (“the Plant”), with the following environmental objectives:
On December 13, 2002, KeySpan commissioned Alberta’s largest acid gas injection system forming the basis of the KeySpan Brazeau River Sour Gas Plant - Geologic Sequestration of CO2 project (“the Project”). The Project has the potential to achieve a 12% reduction in CO2 emissions and cuts SO2 emissions to less than 12.8 tonnes per day, which is 32% or more below the existing license and at an increased processing capacity.
These significant achievements underscore KeySpan’s commitment to obtain greater efficiency and lower emissions from its operating facilities. The Project demonstrates the “made-in-Alberta” actions that industry is undertaking to meet the Alberta Government’s “A Plan for Action” and satisfy the national “Climate Change Plan for Canada”.
Detailed Project Description:
Early in 1999, KeySpan identified an opportunity to economically address environmental issues associated with processing hydrogen sulphide (H2S) gas, sulphur recovery and the reduction of CO2, a greenhouse gas (GHG), and SO2 emissions at the Plant. See attached Supplemental Material for a map of the location and a picture of the facility. The technological solution involved acid gas injection (AGI), which would improve plant efficiencies and decrease GHG emissions, thus achieving a high standard in sour gas processing.
In addition to the significant capital investment required, the complexity of the Project presented the KeySpan team with many engineering and geological challenges. To help the Emerald Award review panel appreciate the full scope of the work behind the project, the following is a brief summary of elements addressed since the start of the Project:
1) Public Consultation and Regulatory Approvals:
A key component of the Project’s development was stakeholder involvement and consultation. KeySpan’s Community Relations implemented a public consultation program that provided information and sought feedback from all potentially affected stakeholders, including government, environmental organizations, private companies, local land owners/users and residents. Overall, the response was quite favourable, largely due to the AGI technology’s proven ability to reduce GHG emissions and virtually eliminate sour gas flaring and sulphur dioxide emissions. Final regulatory approvals were obtained in August 2002 from both Alberta Environment (AENV) and the Alberta Energy Utilities Board (AEUB).
The Plant is a member of the West Central Airshed Society (WCAS), an organization that KeySpan personnel helped to initiate over a decade ago. Besides performing regional air quality monitoring, WCAS encourages pollution prevention projects and other air quality initiatives and is supportive of the Project. See attached letter.
2) Reservoirs & Injection Well:
Alberta’s “A Plan for Action” identifies Carbon Management as one of the key areas for action that follows identified goals and principles of a “made-in-Alberta” approach to climate change. This Carbon Management includes situations where the CO2 by-product of fossil fuel production is stored in geologic formations similar to those from which the fossil fuels were originally extracted. Hence, access to a reservoir that can be used for the long-term storage of CO2 and / or disposal of acid gas is crucial to the success of Carbon Management.
Finding a reservoir that could handle the Plant’s high acid gas disposal rate for decades required significant research. The results of an extensive geological study identified multiple reservoirs that could meet both the containment requirements and the disposal needs of a large sour gas plant for many years. The sequential use of the identified reservoirs will provide interim “stepping stones” to the ultimate use of very large depleted reservoirs in the region.
Injection wells are used to access the deep reservoirs into which the gas is disposed. Although there are existing wells near a gas plant, many criteria must be satisfied for a successful AGI well. A selected reservoir near the plant was drilled, tested and found unsuitable. An alternative reservoir with existing wells that were re-completed presented its own unique challenges.
3) Plant Facilities:
Technology and Innovation is an additional key area of Alberta’s Plan and an emphasis is placed on the environmental performance in the discovery, recovery, processing, support and transport of Alberta’s energy resources. AGI is one such innovative technology that fits this initiative and demonstrates being “best-in-class” for this industrial activity – that is sour gas processing.
The AGI facilities consist of two new compressors with the combined capacity to inject the maximum design rate of recovered acid gas. Utilizing two compressors increases the opportunity to keep the plant on-line under potential upset situations. A dehydration system was included to prevent hydrates, eliminate the potential for corrosion and increase the long-term integrity and safety of the acid gas equipment, pipeline and injection well. The project team chose a propane refrigeration system with methanol injection versus the typical glycol method due to its simpler operational design and better life-cycle economics. Using this system, the condensed water is recycled to the acid gas compressors. Free-water from the compressor system is then routed to the existing produced water system for down-hole disposal.
The new facilities will be the first in Alberta to operate concurrent with an existing sulphur plant until sufficient reservoir storage capacity is available to sustain prolonged full injection volumes. KeySpan’s objective is to completely decommission the existing sulphur plant in less than three years. Running these concurrent sulphur-handling systems requires innovative operational procedures and regulatory licensing to ensure compliance with all environmental standards.
Upon start-up, sulphur recoveries immediately improved from 92.1% to a minimum of 98.4% and will ultimately increase to 100% when full injection is achieved. In addition once full injection is underway, KeySpan will dispose of some 35,000 tonnes per year of CO2, which effectively reduces CO2 emissions by 12% for the whole plant at maximum design. Reducing GHG emissions while processing more sour gas is a notable achievement. This drop in the CO2 emission intensity for the Plant is supportive of Alberta’s goal to reduce by 2020 the province’s GHG emission intensity by 50%.
4) Pipeline:
A customized pipeline transports high concentration acid gas from the Plant to the reservoir(s). In an effort to reduce impact on the environment, KeySpan used 12.1 kilometres of existing pipe and only 6.5 kilometres of new pipeline, using existing corridors as much as possible. Operational integrity of the system was paramount. The condition of the existing pipeline was ensured and a computerized control system in both the plant and field allow for enhanced operation. As an additional safeguard, KeySpan installed specialized corrosion detection devices for on-line monitoring and a metering system for leak detection.
The Climate Change Plan for Canada also identifies key instruments, one of which is the need for new Strategic Infrastructure and particularly a CO2 pipeline system to encourage capture and storage. Although this Project is dedicated to acid gas disposal, it is possible the pipeline and reservoir system could be part of any new province-wide, pipeline system for CO2 disposal.
5) Operational Preparedness:
Due to the hazards associated with acid gas, KeySpan placed significant resources into the Emergency Response Planning (ERP) component of the project. KeySpan installed emergency shut down valves (ESDVs) at the Plant and the pipeline termination point to limit release volumes in the event of a pipeline failure. In addition, six ESDV sites along the pipeline detect high/low pressure fluctuations and shutdown each pipeline segment. To provide a higher safety margin, specialized modeling confirmed that potential scenarios had smaller planning zones than the standard procedure, which was used to set the zones, and that the level of hazard was more manageable. KeySpan continued going the “extra mile” by utilizing The National Oceanographic & Atmospheric Administration, Air Resources Laboratory’s comprehensive data compiled from meteorological stations. The consultant combined this data with the pipeline topography to predict the potential “wind fields”. This data assisted in determining the most realistic dispersion of a ground-based release. Contingency plans at the Plant were also put into place to deal with any unexpected sudden or gradual releases of substances into the environment. In addition, KeySpan maintains programs for equipment integrity, tank leak testing & secondary containment, waste handling and spill control. These design measures and procedures are incorporated into the area’s ERP. Implementation and maintenance of the plan is a key responsibility for KeySpan’s field personnel.
Tangible Environmental Benefits:
- Brazeau Gas Plant Geologic Sequestration of CO2 Project will potentially achieve a 12% reduction of CO2 emissions for the entire plant and potentially dispose of (geologically sequester) 35,000 tonnes per year of CO2.
- The Project improves air quality in the regional airshed through a significant and sustainable reduction of SO2 emissions. The AGI system and sulphur plant operating concurrently will reduce SO2 emissions to less than 12.8 tonnes per day, a 32% decrease from the existing licensed conditions.
- KeySpan’s goal is to completely decommission the existing sulphur plant in less than three years and inject all the acid gas, making the Brazeau River Sour Gas Plant a “zero discharge” facility in terms of SO2 emissions.
Intangible Environmental Benefits:
- The Project is an innovative, industry-driven, “made-in-Alberta” solution that reduces GHG emissions and improves air quality.
- AGI technology is more energy efficient than costly sulphur recovery facilities – reducing energy consumption and land resources required for recovery facilities. The technology is “best-in-class” for sour gas plant processing and mitigates many of the environmental, health and safety concerns of stakeholders.
- Environmental and other organizations, such as the West Central Airshed Society (WCAS), can use the Project as an example to promote and analyze pollution prevention and emission reductions initiatives.
- KeySpan’s investment in the Project was driven by the company’s innovative business model, not regulation, and serves as an example of leadership and foresight at a time when there is increased desire by all stakeholders to reduce atmospheric emissions.
- The Project is consistent with KeySpan’s corporate philosophy regarding the environment, sound business practices, and its continuing efforts to inform and engage the communities where it works about environmental and operating initiatives.
- KeySpan’s Project addresses the AEUB’s plant proliferation policy in that increasing the plant’s sour gas processing capacity discourages development of new sour gas processing plants in its service area.
Demonstration of effort & commitment / Innovation / Other meritorious considerations:
The Brazeau River Sour Gas Plant is the second KeySpan sour gas plant to proactively “de-grandfather” its sulphur recovery facilities to meet or exceed the standards set for new sour gas plants in Alberta and to voluntarily reduce GHG emissions. The first plant was the Rimbey Sour Gas Plant, which was the 2002 recipient of the Large Business Emerald Award, for the “Rimbey Gas Plant Clean Air Initiative”.
In each area where KeySpan operates, the business strategy, as a mid-streamer, is to be the most reliable and most efficient gas processing facility from a cost, marketing, community and environmental perspective. This strategy reflects KeySpan’s commitment for ongoing investment to improve both operating and environmental performance and to differentiate KeySpan’s large, efficient processing facilities from others in the natural gas industry. The objective of this business model is to make KeySpan the natural gas processor of choice in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin.
Highlights of the Project include:
The KeySpan Brazeau River Sour Gas Plant - Geologic Sequestration of CO2 project (“the Project”) included a wide array of engineering, geological, project management, licensing, operational and business challenges over nearly three years. All of the materials, equipment manufacturing and construction were completely sourced and undertaken in Alberta.
On start-up in December 2002, the KeySpan Brazeau River Sour Gas Plant (“the Plant”) became the largest acid gas injection (AGI) system in the province, rated at 400 tonnes per day of sulphur as H2S gas, with a potential to geologically sequester 35,000 tonnes per year of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, a greenhouse gas that causes climate change.
Since commissioning the acid gas injection (AGI) facilities at the Plant, sulphur dioxide (SO2) emissions have been reduced to less than 12.8 tonnes per day, a 32% or more decrease to the previous licensed conditions. With the AGI system fully implemented, the Plant will have completely eliminated SO2 emissions.
By improving the Plant’s gas-processing flexibility and efficiencies, KeySpan has provided the mechanism for the consolidation of smaller, less efficient gas plants, ultimately reducing the cumulative impact to Alberta’s airshed. This Project is an excellent example of achieving sound business objectives through innovative thinking, diligence, engineering and project management.
Supplemental Materials:
Location: The KeySpan Brazeau River Sour Gas Plant (pictured below) is located approximately 90 km southwest of the Town of Drayton Valley in Section 12 of Township 46, Range 14 West of the 5th Meridian. The plant is in Alberta’s Green Zone (a forestry area) and within the Lower Foothills of the Northern East Slopes environmental area.
