Development of Geomechanical Screening Tools to Identify Risk: An Experimental and Modeling Approach for Secure CO 2 Storage Final Technical Report

• Main Authors: Wheeler, Mary, Srinivasan, Sanjay, Espinoza, David
• Language: unknown
• Published: 2019
• Subjects: 42 ENGINEERING; 58 GEOSCIENCES; 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES; Carbonic acid
• Online Access: http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1418156; https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1418156; https://doi.org/10.2172/1418156

CO 2 injection in the subsurface introduces additional complexity in terms of interactions of the reservoir host pore fluid with natural heterogeneity of hydro-mechanical properties of the rock. Natural heterogeneity of the reservoir rock and caprock formations includes spatial variation of hydro-mechanical properties as well as the presence of natural fractures. We developed a coupled mathematical modeling and experimental framework that takes into account the effect of rock heterogeneity on effective mechanical properties of the rock in contact with CO 2 . We performed accurate laboratory experiments to determine the changes in rock mechanical properties due to mineral dissolution in the presence of carbonic acid generated by CO 2 injection. A two-scale adaptive homogenization framework was then developed to consistently upscale petrophysical and geomechanical properties to the field scale. Further, we also developed high-fidelity, numerical solution schemes, non-linear and linear solvers and preconditioners to solve the coupled flow, reactive transport and geomechanical system. The numerical model was then used to study field scale CO 2 sequestration problems for the two selected field sites: (1) Frio formation and (2) Cranfield site. We also developed robust schemes for field data assimilation, model calibration such that the residual uncertainty at the end of the data assimilation procedures can be faithfully represented while taking into account the coupled geochemical and geomechanical processes.