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On the flow of buoyant fluid injected into a confined, inclined aquifer

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 February 2011

IAIN GUNN  and
ANDREW W. WOODS
IAIN GUNN
Affiliation:
BP Institute for Multiphase Flow, University of Cambridge, Madingley Road, Cambridge CB3 0EZ, UK
ANDREW W. WOODS*
Affiliation:
BP Institute for Multiphase Flow, University of Cambridge, Madingley Road, Cambridge CB3 0EZ, UK
*
†Email address for correspondence: andy@bpi.cam.ac.uk
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Abstract

We study the dispersal of a plume of incompressible buoyant fluid injected into a confined sloping aquifer which has an outflow at a single fault which may be up-dip (up-slope) or down-dip (down-slope) from the point of injection. We develop a long-time asymptotic solution for the motion of the injected fluid. We show that for the case in which the outflow fault is up-dip from the point of injection, there is a critical injection rate above which the injected fluid floods the full depth of the aquifer, and we show that for the case in which the outflow fault is down-dip from the point of injection, there is a critical injection rate below which all injected fluid initially flows up-dip. Our analysis leads to expressions for the lateral extent of the injected fluid as a function of time, and we consider the implications of the model for the dispersal of supercritical carbon dioxide injected into deep saline aquifers. The work also indicates that the geometry of the system may have a significant effect on (i) the total volume of carbon dioxide which it is possible to sequester in a faulted aquifer and (ii) the interpretation of the dispersed position of any injected tracers.

JFM classification

Convection: Convection in porous media Geophysical and Geological Flows: Gravity currents
Type
Papers
Information
Journal of Fluid Mechanics , Volume 672 , 10 April 2011 , pp. 109 - 129
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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