Room-Scale CO2 Injections in a Physical Reservoir Model with Faults

Abstract

We perform a series of repeated CO2 injections in a room-scale physical model of a faulted geological cross-section. Relevant parameters for subsurface carbon storage, including multiphase flows, capillary CO2 trapping, dissolution and convective mixing, are studied and quantified. As part of a validation benchmark study, we address and quantify six predefined metrics for storage capacity and security in typical CO2 storage operations. Using the same geometry, we investigate the degree of reproducibility of five repeated experimental runs. Our analysis focuses on physical variations of the spatial distribution of mobile and dissolved CO2, multiphase flow patterns, development in mass of the aqueous and gaseous phases, gravitational fingers and leakage dynamics. We observe very good reproducibility in homogenous regions with up to 97% overlap between repeated runs, and that fault-related heterogeneity tends to decrease reproducibility. Notably, we observe an oscillating CO2 leakage behavior from the spill point of an anticline and discuss the observed phenomenon within the constraints of the studied system.