Capturing and storing CO₂Estimating the storage capacities

The aim of geological storage is to keep CO₂ emissions away from the atmosphere for a long period of time. Natural gas deposits stored over millions of years show that gases can be geologically contained. Germany has suitable storage reservoirs for CO₂ in the form of depleted natural gas deposits and saltwater-bearing rock strata with adequate cap rock that are located at depths of more than 800 m (saline aquifers). A new calculation conducted in 2010 for around 75% of the potentially suitable storage areas estimated the CO₂ storage capacity in the saline aquifers to be between 6.3 and 12.8 billion tonnes. The natural gas fields under the North Sea are not included in the aforementioned estimated values and increase the temporal range of the reservoirs to more than a power plant generation.