A Field Demonstration of an Active Reservoir Pressure Management through Fluid Injection and Displaced Fluid Extraction at the Rock Springs Uplift a Priority Geologic CO2 Storage Site for Wyoming

Abstract

The University of Wyoming is partnered with Los Alamos National Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Battelle, and Water system Specialists Inc. to carry out a DOE funded brine extraction storage test (BEST) project at the Rock Springs Uplift (RSU), southwest Wyoming. The BEST projects are envisioned using a two-phased approach. The initial phase is 1) to predict and monitor the differential pressure and injected fluid movement, and manage changes in formation pressure, and 2) to develop a test-bed for deploying treatment technologies for extracted brines.The RSU shows promise as a CO2 storage location because of its favorable geologic conditions and structure. In addition, the project is located at a carbon storage site in southwest Wyoming that has been extensively characterized on the basis of data obtained from previous U.S. DOE-funded studies that have included detailed site descriptions and CO2 storage capacity and permanence estimates. The primary objective of the project includes:•Refining 3-D reservoir structure and property models of the site that include the known structural complexity and heterogeneity of the site's subsurface conditions;•Evaluate geophysical and chemical monitoring technologies and techniques to detect and measure pressure response to injected fluid as well as track fluid migration pathways;•Analyze the feasibility of extracting formation brine water to mitigate the pressure increase from injection, as well as to modify the pressure front, resulting in the ability to manipulate the direction of the migrating pressure/CO2 plume, and reduce the size of the Area of Review;•Develop advanced fluid flow simulation schemes to predict reservoir pressure responses and migration pathways of the injected fluid;•Implement rock mechanical property and stress calculations, combined with simulations, to help assess geomechanical impacts to the reservoir and confining layers in response to high volume CO2 injections;•Conduct a produced brine life-cycle analysis, and develop a displaced brine water treatment, and management program; and•Propose an active reservoir management strategy that could be implemented during a field testing.The proposed field test project includes developing a field site fully capable of fluid injection, production, monitoring, and water treatment. This effort would provide for in-situ testing of plume migration and pressure management strategies, and investigate the technical feasibility of treating co-produced waters. Furthermore, the result of this effort is a better understanding of the potential effects of pressure and active brine management on the behavior of stored CO2 in the Rocky Mountain region as well as the similar saline aquifers around world, such as the huge saline aquifer in the Ordos Basin, China.