The oil sands industry is at the forefront of the energy transition to net zero emissions and sustainable oil. Canada and the industry’s goal is to produce energy with net zero emissions by 2050. What will it take? Ground-breaking innovation and intense collaboration like the world has never seen before. A unique model of collaboration and innovation, Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance (COSIA) is building on 10 years of innovation to reduce the impacts of oil sands production on air, land and water in the oil sands region. Now a technical division of the Pathways Alliance, COSIA is developing and stewarding a 10-year evergreen plan of technology development that will allow member companies to achieve milestone GHG emission reductions. No one technology will achieve this goal and a suite of solutions are being pursued including molten carbonate fuel cells, solvents, new mining technologies, sunlight-activated water treatment and many, many more.

As part of its suite of innovation opportunities, COSIA is looking for new transformative technologies to capture carbon dioxide (CO2 ) from flue gas streams generated by natural gas combustion in Once Through Steam Generators (OTSGs), or potentially gas turbines in the oil sands industry (mining and in-situ). Activities in this opportunity – Post combustion CO2 capture from natural gas combustion flue gas – will increase industry’s understanding of how to dramatically reduce the cost of capture (especially CAPEX) from diluted CO2 streams (<8 vol%). They will also demonstrate how the most advanced and emerging Post Combustion Capture (PCC) technologies and processes can be economically applied to oil sands production. COSIA is also interested in identifying and developing promising early technology readiness level (TRL) processes and technologies for CO2 capture at a significantly lower cost (OPEX and CAPEX) relative to existing state-of-the art advanced amines.

The drive to achieve decarbonization within the energy sector is motivating the industry to investigate alternative means of producing conventional drop-in fuels. Thermo-oxidative reforming of biomass is one of the most industrially mature technologies which is gaining significant traction, with multiple large-scale projects under various stages of development. An inherent consequence of the reforming pathway is the need to deploy carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies, in a similar vein to existing coal to liquids processes. Unique constraints must be taken into consideration for the deployment of such processes pertaining to factors including process flexibility and trace contaminate profiles; while consideration must also be given to the value of renewable carbon contained in the process feedstock. To achieve long-term decarbonization goals and an efficient circular carbon economy, the energy industry will be required to consider trade-offs and methodologies for assigning value to the conversion of renewable carbon feedstocks. Further to the deployment of CCS processes, advanced biofuels technologies in the form of power-to-liquids (PtL) systems have the potential to utilize CO2 as a feedstock to produce convention liquid fuels. Such technologies promise the ability to monetize existing CO2 stores; and to improve conversion within conventional thermo-oxidative reforming pathways. This presentation will explore the role of carbon capture and utilization technologies in the development of advanced biofuels synthesis pathways; and ultimately, the decarbonization of liquid hydrocarbon fuels

Recently enacted legislation in developed countries imposes escalating penalties for methane emissions in oil and gas operations. The most commonly accepted method for assessing methane venting penalties is based on statistical models that estimate the expected emissions of a facility based on the gas throughput, the gas pressure, and the number of flanges, connectors, pressure regulators, etc., in that facility. Such an assessment method does not accurately reflect the maintenance and inspection practices of the operators. For instance, a facility run by a prudent operator with a well-established preventative maintenance program will likely emit less methane than reflected in calculations based on statistical models—resulting in the operator overpaying for methane emissions. Until recently, there was no practical way to implement a flange-level emissions monitoring program that would accurately identify fugitive emissions and, more importantly, certify the absence of such emissions on properly maintained flanges and connections. In other words, there was no accurate method to determine fugitive emissions, drive preventative maintenance programs to eliminate emissions, and accurately account for emissions to reduce penalty payments for prudent operators. In 2021 and 2022, Xplorobot developed a 3D model-based methane mapping solution to identify and measure emissions accurately. Xplorobot has deployed this solution along Wood PLC in multiple on-shore and off-shore facilities with human workers and autonomous robots. The robots can capture accessible flanges, connectors, pressure regulators, etc., and the person can focus on areas not currently accessible by available robots. The combined 3D maps of the surveyed sites allow for the exact localization of methane concentration down to specific flanges and tags. The joint deployments between Xplorobot and Wood PLC have demonstrated that the precise localization of anomalies allows for instant reports to the operator and immediate repairs within 24 hours of identification. Most importantly, the 3D mapping technique developed by Xplorobot also enabled operators to document the absence of emissions on most flanges and connectors. The detailed account of fugitive emissions down to a flange, with the specific count of those flanges in a 3D model, enables an accurate accounting relative to the statistical model and the ability for a prudent operator to reduce methane emission penalties based on the precise documentation of actual measurements.

All exploration and production projects, whether for oil and gas, mining, or clean tech applications such carbon capture and storage, begin with an accurate image of the subsurface. Many technologies have been developed to enable the acquisition of cost-effective seismic data with high-density land seismic programs becoming commonplace. However, as industry progresses and the long-term surface footprint associated with these programs becomes better understood, new methods are needed to reduce the environmental impact of acquiring seismic data. Technologies such as miniaturized source and recording equipment as well as innovative cutting techniques are providing encouraging results, but the next step towards ecologically intelligent seismic surveys has emerged in the world of seismic program design. The focus of these new designs is to maximize subsurface resolution while minimizing the surface footprint. In forested regions, conventional geometry seismic programs may require cutting 10-25% of the trees within the program area to provide safe access for equipment deployment. Irregular or alternative geometries, however, can reduce the total amount of line clearing within a seismic program by up to 55%. This reduction in land footprint also leads to a reduction in both GHG and methane emissions due to lower fuel consumption and less ground compaction. New acquisition designs are easier to create than to test. Although model attributes and synthetic data can be leveraged to understand the outcomes, confirming how the geometries respond in the real world is a critical validation step. This paper will present the initial testing through processing, interpretation, and inversion of an existing ultra-high density seismic dataset decimated based on ecologically improved program designs.