Estimating CO2 residual trapping from a single-well test: Experimental design calculations

Abstract

Residual trapping is one of the four trapping mechanisms that have been identified for geological CO2 storage, a means to reduce atmospheric emissions and the related impacts as a result of continued use of fossil fuels. The objective of this research is to design a single-well injectionwithdrawal test to estimate residual CO2 trapping (Sgr) in brine aquifers. Due to the high cost associated with drilling to depths of potential CO2 storage site, single-well test can cost-effectively provide data sets to assess reservoir properties and reduce uncertainties in the appraisal phase for finding commercial scale storage sites. The main challenges in the design are the following: (1) It is difficult to quantify the amount that is trapped using a mass balance approach; (2) correlations among various parameters leads to a highly uncertain or non-unique Sgr estimate; and (3) the Sgr estimate could be biased due to heterogeneity of the geological medium. We have proposed our design to address each of these challenges by (1) use a detailed reservoir model to simulate the relevant physical processes in the tests; (2) perform a test sequence that yields multiple types of complementary data to constrain the estimate of Sgr; (3) remove or reduce the bias caused by the heterogeneity of the storage formation by repeating the same test under different saturation conditions. The design will be applied to a practical field test that will be carried out as part of the CO2CRC Otway Project, at Victoria Australia. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. © 2011 Published by Elsevier Ltd.