Gas produced from the Sleipner field has an unusually high concentration of CO2
, so in order to conform with regulations most of it is injected back below the seabed into a saline aquifer.
Had this process not been adopted, and the CO2
produced been allowed to escape to the atmosphere, the licensees of the Sleipner West field would have had to pay NOK 1 million/day in Norwegian CO2
taxes. Sleipner has been reinjecting one million tons of CO2
gas every year since 1996, or the equivalent of the amount produced by about 110,000 Norwegians a year.
Picture courtesy of Statoil
Picture added on 26 November 2006