Conditions and processes controlling carbon mineral trapping in intraformational baffles

Carbon mineral trapping is commonly believed to be insignificant relative to other trapping mechanisms, yet, the role of cm-scale intraformational baffles is rarely considered in reservoir scale assessments. The present study aims to reveal conditions governing carbon mineral trapping and its quantification for a range of rock compositions in intraformational baffles. A series of 2-D multiphase reactive transport simulations were set-up to model the geochemical processes occurring at the interface of a baffle and a reservoir rock for a period of 1000 years. The study shows that the presence of baffles with certain rock properties within the reservoir rock can enhance or reduce carbon mineral trapping capacity relative to homogeneous reservoir rocks depending on clay and carbonate mineral content in baffles. The analysis shows that the precipitation of secondary carbonates occurs at the interface of the two rock types. Furthermore, it was found that higher clay and lower carbonate content of the baffle contribute towards enhancing mineral trapping while the mineralogy of reservoir rock does not have an important influence. The results are further utilized to derive averaged mineral composition for the integration of fine scale processes in coarser scale simulations.

Automated summary

The study reveals the conditions governing carbon mineral trapping and its quantification for a range of rock compositions in intraformational baffles. It shows that the presence of baffles with certain rock properties can enhance or reduce carbon mineral trapping capacity, depending on clay and carbonate mineral content. Furthermore, analysis indicates that the precipitation of secondary carbonates occurs at the interface of the two rock types.