HYSS is a feasibility study to assess the potential for excess wind energy to be stored as Hydrogen gas in manmade subsurface salt caverns directly below or adjacent to offshore wind farm locations around Ireland.
The project will utilise the team’s regional geological knowledge to define offshore areas (to a water depth of 500m) where geological salt formations may be present. Existing oil & gas industry datasets will be interrogated to delineate the extent, thickness, and depth of burial of these geological salt formations.
Phase 1 (WP 2) of the project will focus on the Kish Bank Basin offshore Dublin where exploration wells encountered salt formations. State of the art “PreStack Depth Migration” reprocessing of 130km of existing 2D seismic data was completed in 2012 and is freely available to the project. This data will be integrated with other seismic datasets to delineate potential cavern storage size and distribution, to evaluate the maximum Hydrogen storage potential of the Kish Bank Basin. Finally the potential salt cavern storage sites will be integrated with existing surface datasets, including INFOMAR, seabed cores, traffic routes and environmental considerations, to assess potential surface constraints for salt cavern infrastructure. A common risk segment map of surface and subsurface risks will be produced which will effectively delineate high graded areas.
Phase 2 (WP 3- 6) will utilise the same workflow to assess other locations offshore Ireland, specifically the Celtic Sea Basins to the south, Irish Sea Basins to the east and basins on the Atlantic Margin to the west. The HYSS project will also review the potential of CCS within salt as well as the potential of future repurposing of existing oil & gas infrastructure for Hydrogen storage, such as the Corrib Gas Field where salt formations are known to exist above and below the producing gas reservoir.