Using toughreact to model reactive fluid flow and geochemical transport in hydrothermal systems

The interaction between hydrothermal fluids and the rocks through which they migrate alters the earlier formed primary minerals and leads to the formation of secondary minerals, resulting in changes in the physical and chemical properties of the system. We have developed a comprehensive numerical simulator, TOUGHREACT, which considers nonisothermal multi-component chemical transport in both liquid and gas phases. A variety of subsurface thermo-physical-chemical processes is considered under a wide range of conditions of pressure, temperature, water saturation, and ionic strength. The code can be applied to problems in fundamental analysis of the hydrothermal systems and in the exploration of geothermal reservoirs including chemical evolution, mineral alteration, mineral scaling, changes of porosity and permeability, and mineral recovery from geothermal fluids