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Keating, Elizabeth H.

Publications and source records attributed to Keating, Elizabeth H..

5 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2018

Geologic CO 2 sequestration monitoring design: A machine learning and uncertainty quantification based approach

Monitoring is a crucial aspect of geologic carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) sequestration risk management. Effective monitoring is critical to ensure CO 2 is safely and permanently stored throughout the life-cycle of a geologic CO 2 sequestration project. Effective monitoring involves deciding: (i) where is the optimal location to place the monitoring well(s), and (ii) what type of data (pressure, temperature, CO 2 saturation, etc.) should be measured taking into consideration the uncertainties at geologic sequestration sites. We have developed a filtering-based data assimilation procedure to design effective monitoring approaches. To reduce the computational cost of the filtering-based data assimilation process, a machine-learning algorithm: Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines is used to derive computationally effcient reduced order models from results of full-physics numerical simulations of CO 2 injection in saline aquifer and subsequent multi-phase fluid flow. We use example scenarios of CO 2 leakage through legacy wellbore and demonstrate a monitoring strategy can be selected with the aim of reducing uncertainty in metrics related to CO 2 leakage. We demonstrate the proposed framework with two synthetic examples: a simple validation case and a more complicated case including multiple monitoring wells. The examples demonstrate that the proposed approach can be effective in developing monitoring approaches that take into consideration uncertainties.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2017

Periodic changes in effluent chemistry at cold-water geyser: Crystal geyser in Utah

Crystal geyser is a CO 2 -driven cold-water geyser which was originally drilled in the late 1930’s in Green River, Utah. By utilizing a suite of temporal groundwater sample datasets, in situ monitoring of temperature, pressure, pH and electrical conductivity from multiple field trips to Crystal geyser from 2007 to 2014, periodic trends in groundwater chemistry from the geyser effluent were identified. Based on chemical characteristics, the primary sourcing aquifers are characterized to be both the Entrada and Navajo Sandstones with a minor contribution from Paradox Formation brine. The single eruption cycle at Crystal geyser lasted over four days and was composed of four parts: Minor Eruption (mEP), Major Eruption (MEP), Aftershock Eruption (Ae) and Recharge (R). During the single eruption cycle, dissolved ionic species vary 0–44% even though the degree of changes for individual ions are different. Generally, Na + , K + , Cl - and SO 4 2- regularly decrease at the onset and throughout the MEP. These species then increase in concentration during the mEP. In contrast, Ca 2+ , Mg 2+ , Fe 2+ and Sr 2+ increase and decrease in concentration during the MEP and mEP, respectively. The geochemical inverse modeling with PHREEQC was conducted to characterize the contribution from three end-members (Entrada Sandstone, Navajo Sandstone and Paradox Formation brine) to the resulting Crystal geyser effluent. Results of the inverse modeling showed that, during the mEP, the Navajo, Entrada and brine supplied 62–65%, 36–33% and 1–2%, respectively. During the MEP, the contribution shifted to 53–56%, 45–42% and 1–2% for the Navajo, Entrada and Paradox Formation brine, respectively. Finally, these changes in effluent characteristics further support the hypothesis by Watson et al. (2014) that the mEP and MEP are driven by different sources and mechanisms.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2016

Reduced order models for assessing CO 2 impacts in shallow unconfined aquifers

Risk assessment studies of potential CO 2 sequestration projects consider many factors, including the possibility of brine and/or CO 2 leakage from the storage reservoir. Detailed multiphase reactive transport simulations have been developed to predict the impact of such leaks on shallow groundwater quality; however, these simulations are computationally expensive and thus difficult to directly embed in a probabilistic risk assessment analysis. Here we present a process for developing computationally fast reduced-order models which emulate key features of the more detailed reactive transport simulations. A large ensemble of simulations that take into account uncertainty in aquifer characteristics and CO 2 /brine leakage scenarios were performed. Twelve simulation outputs of interest were used to develop response surfaces (RSs) using a MARS (multivariate adaptive regression splines) algorithm (Milborrow, 2015). A key part of this study is to compare different measures of ROM accuracy. We then show that for some computed outputs, MARS performs very well in matching the simulation data. The capability of the RS to predict simulation outputs for parameter combinations not used in RS development was tested using cross-validation. Again, for some outputs, these results were quite good. For other outputs, however, the method performs relatively poorly. Performance was best for predicting the volume of depressed-pH-plumes, and was relatively poor for predicting organic and trace metal plume volumes. We believe several factors, including the non-linearity of the problem, complexity of the geochemistry, and granularity in the simulation results, contribute to this varied performance. The reduced order models were developed principally to be used in probabilistic performance analysis where a large range of scenarios are considered and ensemble performance is calculated. We demonstrate that they effectively predict the ensemble behavior. But, the performance of the RSs is much less accurate when used to predict time-varying outputs from a single simulation. If an analysis requires only a small number of scenarios to be investigated, computationally expensive physics-based simulations would likely provide more reliable results. Finally, if the aggregate behavior of a large number of realizations is the focus, as will be the case in probabilistic quantitative risk assessment, the methodology presented here is relatively robust.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2013

Code Verification and Confidence-Building

This document described the current status of verification and confidence building activities for the four simulation codes used for groundwater flow and transport simulations in the NRAP project. This is meant to be a ‘living document’ which will evolve as the verification suites expand and the models are tested against new field and laboratory experiments. Documenting these activities will enable the simulation teams at different laboratories to share verification problems, to benchmark against other codes. It will also help stakeholders understand the testing process and to gain confidence in model results.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗