Prague, Dec 21 (CTK) – The Czech Environment Ministry will not permit until 2020 that carbon dioxide be deposited underground, which, however, does not rule out the use of the method in a more remote future, according to a bill the cabinet approved yesterday.
For several years now, geologists have been looking into whether the underground deposition method could be applied in the Czech Republic.
Experts consider the underground method a promising contribution to softening climate change.
That is why the Environment Ministry wants to determine the risks of carbon dioxide´s impact on underground waters and rocks, and also on security.
The Czech Geological Service has already chosen a land belt spreading from Zatec, north Bohemia, to the Krkonose (Giant Mountains) foothills, east Bohemia, and an area in eastern Moravia as potential suitable repository areas with a total capacity of 850 million tonnes of carbon dioxide.
However, the world still lacks an international agreement that would recommend the above method. Moreover, the project´s financing is unclear and the public mistrusts any deposition.
Ways of gathering and depositing carbon dioxide have been sought by Europe, America, Australia and Japan since the 1990s. The first underground repositories operate in Norway, the USA, Canada, Brazil and Saudi Arabia.
The Czech Republic produces about 12 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per capita annually. It wants to markedly reduce the volume to make it close to the EU average of seven tonnes.
The long-term goal, also discussed at the U.N. climate conference in Paris earlier this month, is to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions in order to curb the rise in temperature deep below two degrees Celsius.
rtj/dr/ms
