Numerical Modeling of CO₂ Storage: Applications to the FluidFlower Experimental Setup

Carbon capture and storage is one of the key technologies that can help industries limit their environmental footprint and societies achieve the climate change mitigation goals. The process entails capturing CO2 and injecting it into deep geological formations for permanent storage. However, the design and modeling of carbon sequestration projects entail significant challenges in assessing the risks and long-term consequences. The fate of CO2 in the subsurface is dictated by many processes including solute transport, multiphase compositional effects, and trapping mechanisms. The ability to properly capture these phenomena is limited by the abstraction of numerical models, the uncertainty in petrophysical characterization, and the modeling of the thermodynamic effects. In this work, we study the impact of each of these factors on the fate of CO2 injection in a meter-scale experimental setup. We model the evolution of the CO2 plume inside the tank using the compositional reservoir simulator IPARS (Integrated Parallel Accurate Reservoir Simulator). We then present an ensemble-based approach to quantify the uncertainties and study the predictability of the numerical models. The results emphasize the ability of the reservoir simulator to predict the evolution of CO2 in the FluidFlower experimental setup. They also highlight the importance of considering the uncertainty in experimental testing of petrophysical properties in the risk assessment of geological carbon storage projects.