TY - JOUR
T1 - Flow regime analysis for geologic CO2 sequestration and other subsurface fluid injections
AU - Guo, Bo
AU - Zheng, Zhong
AU - Bandilla, Karl W.
AU - Celia, Michael Anthony
AU - Stone, Howard A.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported in part by the Department of Energy under Grant No. DE-FE0009563 and the Princeton Carbon Mitigation Initiative (CMI) . We thank I. C. Christov, J. M. Nordbotten and R.H. Socolow for helpful discussions. Z. Zheng also thanks the Princeton Environmental Institute for partial support through the CMI Young Investigator Award.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2016/10/1
Y1 - 2016/10/1
N2 - Carbon dioxide (CO2) injection into a confined saline aquifer may be modeled as an axisymmetric two-phase flow problem. Assuming the CO2 and brine segregate quickly in the vertical direction due to strong buoyancy, and neglecting capillary pressure and miscibility, the lubrication approximation leads to a one-dimensional nonlinear advection-diffusion equation that describes the evolution of the sharp CO2-brine interface. The interface evolution is driven by two forces: the force from fluid injection (the lateral pressure gradient due to injection), and buoyancy. Analytical solutions can be derived when one of the two forces is dominant. The solutions depend on the viscosity ratio (M) between the displaced and injected fluids, and a buoyancy parameter (Γ) that measures the relative importance of buoyancy compared to the driving force from injection. Different combinations of these two parameters give different forms of the solutions. But for all the solutions, the radius of the lateral spreading of the injected fluid follows,r∝t1/2 with the proportionality coefficient differing for the different solutions. In this paper, we identify the kinds of solutions appropriate for practical CO2 injection projects as well as other subsurface fluid injection applications. We use data from eight CO2 injection projects, twenty-four acid gas injection projects, two liquid waste disposal projects, and one CO2-WAG enhanced oil recovery project. The solutions provide guidance for the expected behavior of fluid spreading under the different injection operations while providing general insights into overall fluid flow behavior.
AB - Carbon dioxide (CO2) injection into a confined saline aquifer may be modeled as an axisymmetric two-phase flow problem. Assuming the CO2 and brine segregate quickly in the vertical direction due to strong buoyancy, and neglecting capillary pressure and miscibility, the lubrication approximation leads to a one-dimensional nonlinear advection-diffusion equation that describes the evolution of the sharp CO2-brine interface. The interface evolution is driven by two forces: the force from fluid injection (the lateral pressure gradient due to injection), and buoyancy. Analytical solutions can be derived when one of the two forces is dominant. The solutions depend on the viscosity ratio (M) between the displaced and injected fluids, and a buoyancy parameter (Γ) that measures the relative importance of buoyancy compared to the driving force from injection. Different combinations of these two parameters give different forms of the solutions. But for all the solutions, the radius of the lateral spreading of the injected fluid follows,r∝t1/2 with the proportionality coefficient differing for the different solutions. In this paper, we identify the kinds of solutions appropriate for practical CO2 injection projects as well as other subsurface fluid injection applications. We use data from eight CO2 injection projects, twenty-four acid gas injection projects, two liquid waste disposal projects, and one CO2-WAG enhanced oil recovery project. The solutions provide guidance for the expected behavior of fluid spreading under the different injection operations while providing general insights into overall fluid flow behavior.
KW - CO plume
KW - Flow regime
KW - Geologic carbon sequestration
KW - Sharp interface model
KW - Subsurface fluid injection
KW - Vertical equilibrium model
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ijggc.2016.08.007
DO - 10.1016/j.ijggc.2016.08.007
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84991355124
SN - 1750-5836
VL - 53
SP - 284
EP - 291
JO - International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control
JF - International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control
ER -