Underground carbon storage top of mind for student team
Researching how to successfully store carbon underground is helping a group of Virginia Tech students reach new heights.
“Carbon sequestration is really kind of an elegant solution for global warming,” said Lars Koehn, a third-year Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Geosciences. “Normally, we pull carbon out of the ground in the form of fossil fuels, use it for energy, and then put it into the air. But with carbon sequestration, we’re going to put it straight back into the ground into the same types of rocks we pulled it from. So it’s kind of like a circular economy for carbon.”
Koehn is one of eight Virginia Tech graduate students who recently teamed up to research and create a plan for a carbon sequestration project off the coast of Louisiana as a part of the Society of Exploration Geophysicists’ (SEG) EVOLVE Carbon Solutions Professional Program. After students presented their work at the Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage Conference in March, the global not-for-profit organization selected Virginia Tech as the host of the first virtual version of its U.S. regional geoscience trivia contests, officially titled “Challenge Bowl.”
“Some of the SEG EVOLVE teams really require a mentor to provide detailed guidance through the project, but this team has been extremely self-driven,” said Annabella Betancourt, managing director of programs for the society. “They were so diligent and responsible. If they could energize every team with the same spirit and enthusiasm, it would show others how to find the most success within this program.”
The Virginia Tech chapter of the Society of Exploration Geophysicists’ will host the bowl on April 29. The event will feature two-person teams from universities and colleges spanning the country competing for the opportunity to advance to the International Challenge Bowl Finals at IMAGE, the International Meeting for Applied Geoscience and Energy, in Houston this August. Participation in the event is free for qualifying students with the top three teams earning cash prizes.
Hosting the virtual competition marks a milestone for the Virginia Tech SEG EVOLVE team, which consists of four students from the Department of Geosciences and four from the Department of Mining and Minerals Engineering. Armed with seismic and oil drilling data donated by industry partner Fairfield Geotechnologies, the team was tasked with developing a full plan for the implementation of a carbon sequestration site, including the transportation of the carbon, adherence to government regulations, and projections of economic impacts.
“They did a full-blown feasibility study for carbon storage along the Gulf of Mexico, and it was peer-reviewed by their industry mentors,” said Ryan Pollyea, associate professor in the Department of Geosciences and the team’s faculty advisor. “It speaks volumes that this group did such a good job, that SEG is seeking deeper engagement with Virginia Tech.”
Jessica Dostal, a student and early career advisor with the society, said connecting SEG EVOLVE teams with mentors from industry was a critical part of the program’s goal of providing the type of real-life experience that empowers students to “hit the ground running” once they graduate.
“The whole point of the program is to develop those professional practices that help bridge the gap between what you learn in school and industry, and really learn to apply what you’ve learned,” Dostal said.
Providing students with real-world learning opportunities is also in line with the mission of Virginia Tech Advantage.
Koehn said the project did help bridge that classroom-to-workplace gap by posing the team with questions and concerns outside the scope of the traditional classroom or textbook.
“We were addressing things we don’t normally address as students,” he said. “Stuff like, how could this project make money, what are the costs of the project, and how would you get this project approved by the state.”
Along with the opportunities for individual growth, the students said they also see a collective opportunity for the university in this field of research and the SEG U.S. Regional Challenge Bowl is just the tip of the iceberg.
“Virginia Tech can be a major player in carbon sequestration, if we play our cards right,” said Matt Tascione, a Ph.D. student studying geophysics, team member, and president of the Virginia Tech student chapter of the society. “The opportunities are here for us to really latch on to it, we just have to make the most of that. And I think this is a really great way to start doing that.”
