Major CO2 Storage Project Planned by U.S. Company in Illinois

The agribusiness giant, Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), will soon begin construction on what is expected to be the largest carbon dioxide sequestration project in the U.S. The company will sequester CO2 emitted from a facility that will process corn into ethanol, converting the CO2 to a liquid and then pumping it underground for permanent storage in deep rock reservoirs. ADM executives and officials from the U.S. Department of Energy say the project is critical, since other U.S. experiments with large-scale CO2 sequestration — including one planned by American Electric Power — have been scrapped because of high costs and other issues. “We are developing the model that others will follow,” said Scott McDonald, project manager for ADM’s Illinois project. Should large-scale sequestration prove successful at the ethanol plant, the technology may be used at the many coal-fired power plants in the Midwest, which sit atop similar geological formations as the ADM ethanol plant. Meanwhile, a study by University of Edinburgh scientists of natural CO2 seeps from volcanic regions of Italy shows that, contrary to some fears, there is little danger that leaks of sequestered CO2 pose a threat to human health.