Cyclic loading–unloading impacts on geomechanical stability of multiple salt caverns for underground hydrogen storage
Underground caverns in a salt dome are promising geologic features to store hydrogen because of salt’s extremely low permeability and self-healing behavior. The salt cavern storage community, however, has not fully understood the geomechanical behaviors of salt rock driven by quick operation cycles of injection–production, which may significantly impact the cost-effective storage-recovery performance of multiple caverns. Our field-scale generic model captures the impact of cyclic loading–unloading on the salt creep behavior and deformation under different cycle frequencies, operating pressure, and spatial order of operating cavern(s). This systematic simulation study indicates that the initial operation cycle and arrangement of multiple caverns play a significant role in the creep-driven loss of cavern volumes and cavern deformation. Finally, our future study will develop a new salt constitutive model based on geomechanical tests of site-specific salt rock to probe the cyclic behaviors of salt precisely both beneath and above the dilatancy boundary, including reverse (inverse transient) creep, the Bauschinger effect, and damage-healing mechanism.
- Research Organization:
- Sandia National Laboratories (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program; USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)
- Grant/Contract Number:
- NA0003525
- OSTI ID:
- 2505113
- Report Number(s):
- SAND--2025-00762J
- Journal Information:
- International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, Journal Name: International Journal of Hydrogen Energy Vol. 102; ISSN 0360-3199
- Publisher:
- ElsevierCopyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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