Impact of Dilation and Irreversible Compaction on Underground Hydrogen Storage in Depleted Hydrocarbon Reservoirs

Abstract

Underground hydrogen gas storage (UHS) at depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs may balance energy production/ consumption during seasons by utilizing the capability of hydrogen gas. The geomechanical behavior of the reservoir rock during UHS operation cycles is an effective parameter of the overall quality and quantity of this operation. This study investigated the impact of rock geomechanical behavior on the quality and quantity of UHS operation performance in a depleted oil reservoir. Three geomechanical behaviors, namely, elastic deformation, irreversible compaction of rock, and dilation−recompaction, form the basis of this study. We numerically investigated how these cases affect wellbore injectability, hydrogen recovery, production of in situ reservoir fluids, and the number of hydrogen injection/production wells. Based on the results of this study, the performance of wells during the injection of hydrogen in the dilation case was better than in other cases. After 10 cycles, 87% of the designed cumulative volume of hydrogen was injected into the reservoir. Though the irreversible compaction case injected the least cumulative hydrogen, it generated the highest hydrogen recovery during annual cycles and at the end of UHS operation (93%). The production of nonhydrogen fluids is known as a problem in UHS operations in depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs. After 10 cycles of hydrogen injection and production and 3 years of prolonged production, the dilation case produced less water and oil overall than other cases. Also, fewer wells are required to achieve the designed injection amount in the dilation case compared to base and irreversible compaction cases. Therefore, the costs associated with hydrogen injection and production wells in reservoirs with geomechanical dilation behavior are lower.

Hydrogen production, transportation, utilization, and storage: Recent advances towards sustainable energy

“…They also require less capital and operational cost as the existing infrastructure can be easily repurposed to operate with H2 [454,455] (refer to previous discussion in section 3). Moreover, H2 storage in these types of reservoirs is safe as demonstrated in recent modeling and numerical simulation studies [417,422,461,426,456,457,457,458,[458][459][460].…”

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“…There are some interesting studies conducted recently related to underground hydrogen storage. For example, Kanaani and Sedaee studied the reservoir rock’s geomechanical behavior during the underground hydrogen storage process . Chen et al analyzed the interaction of the Hydrogen-Shale gas system using molecular simulation .…”

“…For example, Kanaani and Sedaee studied the reservoir rock's geomechanical behavior during the underground hydrogen storage process. 28 Chen et al analyzed the interaction of the Hydrogen-Shale gas system using molecular simulation. 29 Alhamad and coauthors investigated the potential application of methyl orange in the sandstone reservoirs to enhance the hydrogen trapping efficiency.…”

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“…The pressure was set at either 100 or 200 bar, relevant for UHS. 10 The temperature for all simulations was 298 K, slightly cooler than the reservoir temperature of 318 K. 40 The small temperature difference is not expected to alter the results significantly, while conducting the simulations at 298 K allows validation of the computational results with future experiments, conducted at ambient temperature.…”