For now, carbon capture pipeline development is on hold in Illinois after Gov. JB Pritzker signed legislation establishing new regulations surrounding the burgeoning industry, including a temporary moratorium on pipeline development.
That means the plans of Gibson City-based ethanol production company One Earth Energy — as One Earth Sequestration — to build a pipeline from Ford to McLean County are temporarily delayed, though permits with the federal Environmental Protection Agency for two carbon capture storage wells in eastern McLean County remain pending.
Carbon capture sequestration is not yet a widespread industry or practice, though planned projects have begun to pop up across the country and the federal government has offered financial incentives to developers and companies to accelerate its growth.
The goal is to capture carbon from large industrial operations and store it deep underground, reducing the overall carbon footprint of industry and aiding climate change efforts.
And while pipeline development is temporarily delayed in the state, One Earth president Steve Kelly said the plan is to re-file an application with the Illinois Commerce Commission to develop that pipeline once the moratorium is lifted.
Kelly recently spoke to WGLT about the company's
goals for carbon capture and storage in an interview that has been edited for clarity.
WGLT: What's the end goal for OES?
Kelly: We currently produce about 150 million gallons of fuel-grade ethanol today.
If we are successful in sequestering the CO2 that we generate through that fermentation process, then we can reduce the carbon footprint of that ethanol. With that, then, we can qualify that ethanol for further refining to make sustainable aviation fuel.
As the fuel market evolves from gasoline — and we blend 10% of that market today — and we go to electric vehicles, we'll see that market share shrink.
We have to pivot at some point in time and find a better means for this same-grade fuel.
Does the electrification of certain sectors, then, pose a threat to ethanol production and the farming that feeds into that?
I don't know that it poses a threat.
I think, in any time, there's always opportunities, and people have to figure out how to change and take advantage of those new opportunities.
We created this plant in 2009 — it's just a different world today and we've got to adapt to that different world. But I think it's a logical conclusion for us to be able to take a clean-burning, renewable fuel that's made from corn and continue to offer the same demand to our customer base out here and support our local community and counties of Ford and McLean and Livingston and Iroquois.
The federal government has been very interested in developing this tech and has incentivized some of these projects —
The Department of Energy has been crucial to the success of sequestration — that's how the whole project got started in Decatur in 2011. That was the first benchmark for testing the Mt. Simon Sandstone. It's been part of the earth in Illinois for hundreds of millions of years, but now we're discovering that it's there and how we can better utilize it.
Environmental groups were very vocal about their concerns about this. You mentioned the Mt. Simon [Sandstone] but they often mentioned the Mahomet Aquifer. What's your take on those concerns?
We applied for the Class VI permits from Region Five, the federal EPA and their No. 1 objective is to protect groundwater.
I think we did our due diligence to make sure that we we are not around the Mahomet Aquifer, and we don't feel that there's any concern there.
What makes you so confident?
Well, because we engaged the geologists from the Illinois State Geological Society to pinpoint where they felt they knew where the aquifer was and we diligently positioned our potential wells outside of that region.
We feel like we have a good, at least a six-mile buffer from the Mahomet Aquifer.
There was also talk about safety — local agencies and for landowners.
Some of the local landowners had questions about how would we know if there was a leak in our area.
They frankly just came out and said, "Would you supply us with CO2 detectors for our homes?"
And we said, yeah sure, if that gives you a comfort level.
Now realize that that story is probably about a year old, and where we've evolved now through the legislation is that we're required to do testing for atmosphere and for groundwater and for soil. So, we're going to have better technology than I ever promised them a year ago.
[Regarding CO2 emergencies] I think it's been very interesting to meet with the Illinois Emergency Management Agency people. We found that the public had those concerns, but IEMA didn't have those concerns.
A lot of the IEMA agencies don't see CO2 pipelines significantly different than natural gas, crude oil or other pipelines that are running through their districts today, so they feel like they're already prepared for incidents.
Did you get all of the easements you needed [for the projects]?
We have all of the easements to get to well number one and we have all of the pore space — or 98% — to get to well number two. We sold it as a business opportunity and they accepted it as that. They're business people and their land is an asset and it was just another opportunity.
You know, today they've got windmills. Tomorrow they're going to have solar panels — and if they're working with us, if we're successful with the regulatory agencies, they're going to have a pipeline through it.
