Merits of pressure and geochemical data as indicators of CO2/brine leakage into a heterogeneous, sedimentary aquifer

Trainor-Guitton, Whitney; Mansoor, Kayyum; Sun, Yunwei; Carroll, Susan

doi:10.1016/j.ijggc.2016.07.002

Merits of pressure and geochemical data as indicators of CO₂/brine leakage into a heterogeneous, sedimentary aquifer

Journal Article · Mon Sep 19 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijggc.2016.07.002· OSTI ID:1466953

Trainor-Guitton, Whitney ^[1]; Mansoor, Kayyum ^[2]; Sun, Yunwei ^[2]; Carroll, Susan ^[2]

Colorado School of Mines, Golden, CO (United States). Dept. of Geophysics
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)

This study assesses the merits of pressure data and geochemical data as indicators of a combined CO₂/brine leakage into a heterogeneous, sedimentary aquifer. We simulate the changes in three aquifer responses (pressure, total dissolved solids (TDS), and pH) due to CO₂/brine leakage at an abandoned well with an uncertain location and hypothesize that these changes can only be observed from a single shallow monitoring well, mimicking the low density of observation wells for the considered aquifer. Specifically, detection likelihoods are calculated to describe how frequently pressure, TDS, and pH signals will coincide with a leak for observations made at different distances and times from the initiation of the CO₂/brine leakage rate. The pressure signal gives a more spatially extensive signal than either TDS or pH, and pressure detection probabilities increase upstream of flow barriers (pressurizing-affect). The pH and TDS rebound down-stream of the flow barriers. Finally, when only considering the samples that experience the highest leakage volumes, there is a 50% likelihood of detecting a pressure change 400 m away at times ≥30 years. However, the TDS and pH detection likelihoods are <20% at 100 m distance for times ≥30 years.

View Accepted Manuscript (DOE)

Research Organization:: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE; USDOE Office of Fossil Energy (FE)

Grant/Contract Number:: AC52-07NA27344

OSTI ID:: 1466953

Alternate ID(s):: OSTI ID: 1396560

Report Number(s):: LLNL-JRNL--737589; 890471

Journal Information:: International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control, Journal Name: International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control Journal Issue: C Vol. 52; ISSN 1750-5836

Publisher:: ElsevierCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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Cited By (2)

Analytical Model for Leakage Detection in CO₂ Sequestration in Deep Saline Aquifers: Application to ex Situ and in Situ CO₂ Sequestration Processes Ahmadi, Mohammad Ali; Chen, Zhangxin ACS Omega, Vol. 4, Issue 25 https://doi.org/10.1021/acsomega.9b02668	journal	December 2019
Sensitivity thresholds of groundwater parameters for detecting CO2 leakage at a geologic carbon sequestration site Berger, Peter M.; Wimmer, Bracken; Iranmanesh, Abbas Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, Vol. 191, Issue 11 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-019-7880-7	journal	October 2019

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58 GEOSCIENCES
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