Visualization and prediction of supercritical CO2 distribution in sandstones during drainage: An in situ synchrotron X-ray micro-computed tomography study

Voltolini, Marco; Kwon, Tae-Hyuk; Ajo-Franklin, Jonathan

doi:10.1016/j.ijggc.2017.10.002

Title: Visualization and prediction of supercritical CO₂ distribution in sandstones during drainage: An in situ synchrotron X-ray micro-computed tomography study

Journal Article · Sat Oct 21 00:00:00 EDT 2017 · International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijggc.2017.10.002· OSTI ID:1420108

Voltolini, Marco ^[1]; Kwon, Tae-Hyuk ^[2]; Ajo-Franklin, Jonathan ^[1]

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Korea Advanced Inst. Science and Technology (KAIST), Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

Pore-scale distribution of supercritical CO₂ (scCO₂) exerts significant control on a variety of key hydrologic as well as geochemical processes, including residual trapping and dissolution. Despite such importance, only a small number of experiments have directly characterized the three-dimensional distribution of scCO₂ in geologic materials during the invasion (drainage) process. Here, we present a study which couples dynamic high-resolution synchrotron X-ray micro-computed tomography imaging of a scCO₂/brine system at in situ pressure/temperature conditions with quantitative pore-scale modeling to allow direct validation of a pore-scale description of scCO2 distribution. The experiment combines high-speed synchrotron radiography with tomography to characterize the brine saturated sample, the scCO₂ breakthrough process, and the partially saturated state of a sandstone sample from the Domengine Formation, a regionally extensive unit within the Sacramento Basin (California, USA). The availability of a 3D dataset allowed us to examine correlations between grains and pores morphometric parameters and the actual distribution of scCO₂ in the sample, including the examination of the role of small-scale sedimentary structure on CO2 distribution. The segmented scCO₂/brine volume was also used to validate a simple computational model based on the local thickness concept, able to accurately simulate the distribution of scCO₂ after drainage. The same method was also used to simulate Hg capillary pressure curves with satisfactory results when compared to the measured ones. Finally, this predictive approach, requiring only a tomographic scan of the dry sample, proved to be an effective route for studying processes related to CO₂ invasion structure in geological samples at the pore scale.

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Research Organization:: Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRC) (United States). Center for Nanoscale Control of Geologic CO2 (NCGC); Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)

Grant/Contract Number:: AC02-05CH11231

OSTI ID:: 1420108

Journal Information:: International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control, Vol. 66, Issue C; ISSN 1750-5836

Publisher:: ElsevierCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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Cited by: 21 works

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Title: Visualization and prediction of supercritical CO2 distribution in sandstones during drainage: An in situ synchrotron X-ray micro-computed tomography study

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Title: Visualization and prediction of supercritical CO₂ distribution in sandstones during drainage: An in situ synchrotron X-ray micro-computed tomography study