Carbon Capture, Storage Advocated For In Committee

(Source: MIRS.news, Published 04/18/2025) The Michigan Success Coalition announced support for potential legislation establishing a carbon capture and storage permitting program to be run by the state of Michigan after the House Energy Committee heard testimony on carbon capture and storage.

Dr. Autumn Haagsma, of Western Michigan University’s Michigan Geological Repository for Research, explained to the committee Tuesday that carbon capture is defined as capturing greenhouse gas carbon dioxide from anthropogenic sources and permanently stored it.

According to Haagsma, the process includes multiple technologies that have the capability to capture carbon dioxide from industrial sources. The carbon dioxide is then compressed and transported to a storage site through a pipeline, ship, truck, etc., and injected into geologic formations, such as porous basalts, depleted oil and saline reservoirs.

There are only a few places globally that have all three geological formations to store carbon dioxide, and “Michigan is one of those places,” she said.

She said a regional study concluded that at least 50 million tons of carbon dioxide could be stored in the Niagaran Reefs in Michigan using enhanced oil recovery, where depleted oil and gas fields are used to store the gas and the oil can be used and processed again. She said more than 100 million barrels of oil could be recycled using the reefs.

Using enhanced oil recovery can also help make carbon capture more financially desirable to companies because the transportation and technology associated with carbon capture by itself can be very expensive, she said.

The department is working to mitigate the risks of carbon capture and storage utilization, such as leakages. Michigan has “a very structurally stable basin,” because the state isn’t at a high risk for natural disasters like earthquakes, she said. More work needs to be done in understanding the limitations of carbon capture storage in Michigan before permitting begins, she said.

Bob Mannes, representing the carbon capture company Core Energy, said the process has been around for decades and can be profitable.

“From a project development standpoint, we need to get that permitting,” Mannes said. "We don't need the federal government telling us what we need. We know our geology. The folks at EGLE (Environment, Great Lakes and Energy) are well qualified to do this.”