Advances, challenges, and prospects of carbon dioxide capture, utilization, and storage technologies for carbon neutrality
Caineng ZOU, Chenjun ZHANG, Jun CHENG, Weifeng LYU, Xu Jin, Ming GAO, Songtao Wu, Hongwei Yu, Huidi Yu, Zhi Yang, Guoqiang SANG, Lanqiong Zhang, Hanlin LIU, Ke Wang
Abstract
This study reviews the recent progress and trends of carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) technologies, with a particular focus on related policy orientations, technological status, and representative projects across North America, Europe, the Middle East, and China. The technical connotations of CCUS are elucidated, and the existing issues and challenges are identified from the perspectives of technology, economics, safety and system integration. The CO 2 capture technologies are relatively mature; the emergence of novel processes such as direct air capture (DAC) and advanced materials such as metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) offer new choices for efficient capture, but issues related to high energy consumption and operational costs remain unresolved. The CO 2 geological utilization has developed earlier, where breakthroughs rely on effective source matching, enhanced miscibility and increased swept volume. The CO 2 chemical utilization exhibits broad market potential for producing high value-added products, and the development of catalytic systems with high conversion efficiency and low cost is identified as the core challenge. For CO 2 storage, diverse geological bodies provide vast theoretical capacities on both land and offshore worldwide, but subsidy policies and carbon market regulation are required to offset the limited economic returns of storage technologies. This study highlights several frontier technologies, including low-concentration CO 2 capture, CO 2 -enhanced oil recovery (EOR), CO 2 -based green fuel synthesis, microbial CO 2 conversion, CO 2 mineralization and hydrogen production, and CO 2 cushion gas replacement in underground gas storage (UGS). Through cost-effective innovation, regional pipeline network development, flexible technology integration, coordinated macro-policy regulation, and cross-disciplinary collaboration, CCUS can achieve a transformative scale-up from million-ton and ten-million-ton capacities to the hundred-million-ton level, contributing to the achievement of the carbon neutrality goals of China.