The US National Energy Technology Lab’s new report1 ‘Risk Analysis and Simulation for Geologic Storage of CO2’ is a veritable treatise on modeling fluids in rock—including fluid flow, thermal, geo-mechanics, chemistry and risk analysis. While carbon capture and storage (CCS) borrows much technology from oil and gas, there are notable differences. Not the least is that while an oil or gas reservoir has a trapping mechanism, the same cannot be assumed for CCS in saline formations where ‘the existence and effectiveness of the confining zone must be demonstrated through careful characterization before injection and monitoring after injection begins.’ The study leverages commercial software including Schlumberger’s Eclipse, GMI’s geomechanics tools, Dassault’s Simulia and CMG’s GEMS along with tools developed by NETL and other government labs.
Risk analysis is achieved using the DOE’s Certification Framework, a ‘simple and transparent’ methodology to estimate the risks of CO2 and brine leakage in carbon capture and storage CCS operations. The Framework is used at the DoE’s Westcarb and Secarb test sites. The 110 page oeuvre offers as good an overview of geological and fluid flow modeling and modern risk analysis as we have seen in the public domain.
1 www.oilit.com/links/1101_17.
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