 Characterization of local capillary trap clusters in storage aquifersBo Ren and Luca Trevisan Energy, 2020, vol. 193, issue C Abstract: Local capillary trapping occurs when buoyant CO2 moves upward in a saline aquifer during geologic carbon sequestration. The volumetric capacity of local capillary traps (LCTs) is controlled by reservoir geological heterogeneity. These traps are thus intrinsic to heterogeneous storage aquifers; their volumetric capacities are however largely unknown. To address this issue, this work employs an easily calculated criterion that requires only a static geologic model to estimate the properties of LCT clusters, including size, frequency, and extent. Specifically, this work quantitatively analyzes: i) the properties of the largest LCT cluster; and ii) the impact of reservoir heterogeneity on cluster properties. The key finding of this work is that spatially-correlated reservoir heterogeneity in the horizontal direction causes the largest LCT cluster to laterally span across a given domain even when the horizontal correlation length is small (only 1/25th) compared to the domain width. The overall work sheds useful insights of the dependence of LCT clusters on reservoir heterogeneity and its implication for CO2 trapping quantification. Keywords: Geological carbon sequestration; Local capillary trapping; Cluster characterization; Reservoir heterogeneity (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:193:y:2020:i:c:s0360544219324909 DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2019.116795 Access Statistics for this article Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser More articles in Energy from Elsevier |
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