At a trio of spots in rural Georgia, including Bartow County, the state’s largest utility is boring holes thousands of feet into the Earth’s crust.
The purpose isn’t to suck up water or to hunt for rare minerals. Instead, Georgia Power is testing to see if the rocks as much as 2 miles down might be a suitable place to store carbon dioxide produced by its oil- and gas-fired power plants, instead of allowing the heat-trapping gas to escape into the atmosphere.
In recent weeks, the company has drilled boreholes in rural Georgia to evaluate whether sites are suitable for geologic carbon sequestration. It’s a technique in which carbon dioxide — the main greenhouse gas emitted by burning fossil fuels — is captured, compressed into a liquid-like state and then injected into porous rock. If CO2 from a smokestack can be collected and pumped underground, the idea is stashing it in rocks will prevent worsening global warming.
While Georgia Power and its parent — Southern Company — say the testing is preliminary, the federal government is pumping millions into advancing carbon storage and new, more lucrative tax credits are available for companies that pursue it. At the same time Georgia Power and other utilities add more fossil fuels to their energy mix, new emissions limits for power plants could force many to capture and store the CO2 they produce to remain in operation.