Non-Seismic Geophysical Approaches to Monitoring

This chapter considers the application of a number of different geophysical techniques for monitoring geologic sequestration of CO2. The relative merits of the seismic, gravity, electromagnetic (EM) and streaming potential (SP) geophysical techniques as monitoring tools are examined. An example of tilt measurements illustrates another potential monitoring technique, although it has not been studied to the extent of other techniques in this chapter. This work does not represent an exhaustive study, but rather demonstrates the capabilities of a number of geophysical techniques on two synthetic modeling scenarios. The first scenario represents combined CO2 enhance oil recovery (EOR) and sequestration in a producing oil field, the Schrader Bluff field on the north slope of Alaska, USA. The second scenario is of a pilot DOE CO2 sequestration experiment scheduled for summer 2004 in the Frio Brine Formation in South Texas, USA. Numerical flow simulations of the CO2 injection process for each case were converted to geophysical models using petrophysical models developed from well log data. These coupled flow simulation geophysical models allow comparrison of the performance of monitoring techniques over time on realistic 3D models by generating simulated responses at different times during the CO2 injection process. These time-lapse measurements are used to produce time-lapse changes in geophysical measurements that can be related to the movement of CO2 within the injection interval