Pressure Monitoring to Detect Fault Rupture Due to CO₂ Injection

Journal Article · Fri Aug 18 00:00:00 EDT 2017 · Energy Procedia

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.egypro.2017.03.1529· OSTI ID:1417169

Keating, Elizabeth ^[1]; Dempsey, David ^[2]; Pawar, Rajesh ^[1]

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1. Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
2. The Univ. of Aukland, Auckland (New Zealand)

The capacity for fault systems to be reactivated by fluid injection is well-known. In the context of CO₂ sequestration, however, the consequence of reactivated faults with respect to leakage and monitoring is poorly understood. Using multi-phase fluid flow simulations, this study addresses key questions concerning the likelihood of ruptures, the timing of consequent upward leakage of CO₂, and the effectiveness of pressure monitoring in the reservoir and overlying zones for rupture detection. A range of injection scenarios was simulated using random sampling of uncertain parameters. These include the assumed distance between the injector and the vulnerable fault zone, the critical overpressure required for the fault to rupture, reservoir permeability, and the CO₂ injection rate. We assumed a conservative scenario, in which if at any time during the five-year simulations the critical fault overpressure is exceeded, the fault permeability is assumed to instantaneously increase. For the purposes of conservatism we assume that CO₂ injection continues ‘blindly’ after fault rupture. We show that, despite this assumption, in most cases the CO₂ plume does not reach the base of the ruptured fault after 5 years. As a result, one possible implication of this result is that leak mitigation strategies such as pressure management have a reasonable chance of preventing a CO₂ leak.

• Research Organization: Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Fossil Energy (FE), Clean Coal and Carbon Management
• Grant/Contract Number: AC52-06NA25396
• OSTI ID: 1417169
• Report Number(s): LA-UR-17-28171
• Journal Information: Energy Procedia, Vol. 114, Issue C; ISSN 1876-6102
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

58 GEOSCIENCES
Earth Sciences
leak detection
pressure monitoring
fault rupture