<tideeAbstracts><tideeAbs><Refno>4553</Refno><Contributors>Bridges JE.</Contributors><PublishYear>2007.</PublishYear><Source><italic>IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion</italic> 22(1): 103–109</Source><Affiliation>JEB Research, Inc., Park Ridge, Illinois 60068</Affiliation><Title>Wind power energy storage for in situ shale oil recovery with minimal CO<sub>2</sub> emissions

TERI

TERI Information Digest on Energy and Environment

0972-67210975-7589

The Energy and Resources Institute

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Abstracts of dissertations or articles

Oil shales and tar sands

62007

62176176

<tideeAbstracts><tideeAbs><Refno>4553</Refno><Contributors>Bridges JE.</Contributors><PublishYear>2007.</PublishYear><Source><italic>IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion</italic> 22(1): 103–109</Source><Affiliation>JEB Research, Inc., Park Ridge, Illinois 60068</Affiliation><Title>Wind power energy storage for in situ shale oil recovery with minimal CO<sub>2</sub> emissionsThe trillion barrel oil shale and oil sand deposits in North America offer the potential to make the country less energy dependent on unreliable foreign sources. However, if these unconventional deposits were produced using existing combustion processes, substantial CO₂ emissions would be injected into air. To avoid this greenhouse gas problem and yet produce liquid fuels, a wind-powered electrothermal energy storage system is described. It stores the unpredictable intermittent wind electrical energy as thermal energy over long periods in thick fossil hydrocarbon deposits. Because thermal diffusion time is very slow in such deposits, thermal energy is effectively trapped in a defined section of the hydrocarbon deposit. This allows time for the thermal energy to convert hydrocarbons into gaseous and liquid fuels. The process is highly energy efficient and makes available considerably more energy than was expended during the heating. In addition, the method can increase the reliability of the grid and provide a load-levelling function. The wind-powered electrothermal conversion method produces substantially less CO₂ than traditional shale oil extraction processes or renewable energy processes that employ a combustion step to produce the fuel. (10 figures, 16 references)