A framework to simulate the blowout of CO2 through wells in geologic carbon storage

It is important to evaluate the risks associated with CO2 leakage in large scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects. Leaky wells are considered a major concern for potential CO2 leakage in geologic carbon storage. The most rapid and spectacular mode of CO2 leakage is the blowout of a CO2 storage well. The Sheep Mountain CO2 blowout in March 1982 is an example of this type of catastrophe wherein several thousand tons of CO2 were released into the atmosphere every day. The blowout was stopped only in early April. In the current work we present a numerical framework to simulate blowouts of CO2 wells accounting for the supercritical-liquid-gas-solid phase transitions of CO2 during the process. It is an in-house finite volume method based code for CO2 transport in open wells, relying on a hybrid Span-Wagner equations of state. We present extensive verification and validation of the code against numerical and experimental data in the literature. When applied to well blowouts, our numerical method is able to identify the locations along the well where CO2 transitions between its different phases. Our simulations show that while the heat transfer between CO2 and the casing has a significant impact on the transient characteristics of the blowout, it does not affect the steady-state leakage rate significantly. We also find that the CO2 leakage rate increases as the total depth of the well increases, with an average leakage rate of 2.09 x 104 tons per day across all the well depths simulated ranging between 1 km and 3.5 km. Our simulations show that when the temperature and pressure at the well bottom are appreciably lower than the geothermal temperature and hydrostatic pressure at the given depth, CO2 is released as dry ice at the wellhead. The dry ice modeled here has a significant time-averaged mass fraction of 30% at quasi-steady state, and causes rapid fluctuations in the CO2 leakage rate.

Automated summary

It is important to evaluate the risks associated with CO2 leakage in large scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects. Leaky wells are considered a major concern for potential CO2 leakage in geologic carbon storage. We present a numerical framework to simulate blowouts of CO2 wells accounting for the supercritical-liquid-gas-solid phase transitions of CO2 during the process. Our simulations show that when the temperature and pressure at the well bottom are significantly lower than the geothermal temperature and hydrostatic pressure at the given depth, CO2 is released as dry ice at the wellhead.