Underwater technology company Sonardyne is to provide passive seismic monitoring services at the UK’s first carbon capture and storage (CCS) site. The services, added to an existing contract with Northern Endurance Partnership (NEP) will form part of a wider monitoring programme at the Endurance CO2 storage site beneath the North Sea.
Sonardyne will adapt, deploy and operate advanced ocean bottom seismometers (OBSs), manufactured by Germany technology company KUM GmbH, on the seabed above the Endurance storage reservoir, about 75km off the coast of Yorkshire, UK. NEP will enable carbon captured by emitters in Teesside and the Humber – collectively known as the East Coast Cluster – to be transported and then stored in Endurance and neighbouring storage sites.
The initial phase of the project is expected to see up to 100m tonnes of CO2 stored in the Endurance aquifer over a 25-year period, helping to achieve net zero goals in one of the UK’s most carbon intensive industrial regions. The additional work scope at Endurance is a further endorsement of Sonardyne’s capabilities in support of CCS operations, building on its existing contract to provide environmental monitoring services using Sonardyne technologies across the Endurance site.
The passive seismic monitoring services to be provided will generate baseline data ahead of NEP operations, with a potential for these services to continue into injection, to provide longer-term surveillance of the subsurface. Storage at the site is expected to start in 2028, making it the first operational CCS project in the UK.
The OBS monitoring scope is expected to start in the summer of 2026 with the first seismic data delivered to NEP one year later. This will help to characterise any naturally occurring seismic activity in this region.
Image above: An artist’s illustration of a CCS site, with environmental and passive seismic monitoring (not to scale). Image from Sonardyne.
For more information please visit https://www.sonardyne.com/