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Modeling Reactive Flows in Porous Media


EMSL Project ID
34926

Abstract

During the course of the project we will apply PFLOTRAN to uranium
migration at the Hanford 300 Area and to CO2 sequestration in subsurface
geologic formations. In addition, we will test new innovations to PFLOTRAN
including AMR, and incorporating multiscale processes. At the Hanford site
the system size is roughly 2 x 1.2 x 0.05 km. The goal will be to capture the
observed slow leaching of uranium from the Hanford sediment and model the
behavior of the uranium plume over time taking into account variations in the
Columbia River stage. Approximately 10 degrees of freedom per node is
needed to represent uranium chemisty in a partially saturated environment.
PFLOTRAN will be applied to sequestration of CO2 at the SACROC 3D field
site using initially a nine million node logically structured grid. Approximately
10 degrees of freedom per node will be used to represent chemical
interactions between the formation brine, CO2 plume, and the host rock.
Characteristic features of this problem involve fingering driven by buoyancy as CO2 dissolves into the aqueous phase affecting dissipation of the CO2
plume. The width of the fingers can range from sub-meter to tens of meters
depending on the Rayleigh number characterizing the formation. We plan to
perform four-phase simulations involving oil, liquid and gaseous CO2, and an aqueous phase to investigate leakage of CO2 following injection of
supercritical CO2 into a depleted oil reservoir containing abandoned oil wells.

Project Details

Project type
Capability Research
Start Date
2009-06-01
End Date
2009-12-31
Status
Closed

Team

Principal Investigator

Peter Lichtner
Institution
Los Alamos National Laboratory

Team Members

Barry Lee
Institution
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Richard Mills
Institution
Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Glenn Hammond
Institution
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory