TY - JOUR
T1 - Cubic-meter scale laboratory fault re-activation experiments to improve the understanding of induced seismicity risks
AU - Oye, Volker
AU - Stanchits, Sergey
AU - Babarinde, Oladipupo
AU - Bauer, Robert
AU - Dichiarante, Anna Maria
AU - Langet, Nadège
AU - Goertz-Allmann, Bettina
AU - Frailey, Scott
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported as part of the Center of Geological Storage of CO2, an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science. We are thankful to N. Seprodi for help during conducting the laboratory experiment. Data for this project were provided by work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under award number DE-FC26-05NT42588 and the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022, The Author(s).
PY - 2022/12
Y1 - 2022/12
N2 - To understand fluid induced seismicity, we have designed a large-scale laboratory experiment consisting of a one-cubic-meter sandstone with an artificial fault cut and fluid-injection boreholes. The sandstone block is assembled in a true triaxial loading frame and equipped with 38 piezoelectric sensors to locate and characterise acoustic emission events. The differential stress on the artificial fault is increased in stages to bring it towards a critically stressed state. After each stage of differential stress increase, fluids are injected at low pressures through boreholes to test the potential of fault re-activation. In addition, a high-pressure injection was conducted that created a hydraulic fracture from the injection borehole towards the artificial fault. The newly generated fluid pathway resulted in an activation of the complete block through a stick–slip movement. We compare acoustic emission measurements from the laboratory experiment with seismicity observations from the field-scale CO2 injection at Decatur, Illinois, U.S., and conclude that the existence of fluid pathways plays a decisive role for the potential of induced seismicity.
AB - To understand fluid induced seismicity, we have designed a large-scale laboratory experiment consisting of a one-cubic-meter sandstone with an artificial fault cut and fluid-injection boreholes. The sandstone block is assembled in a true triaxial loading frame and equipped with 38 piezoelectric sensors to locate and characterise acoustic emission events. The differential stress on the artificial fault is increased in stages to bring it towards a critically stressed state. After each stage of differential stress increase, fluids are injected at low pressures through boreholes to test the potential of fault re-activation. In addition, a high-pressure injection was conducted that created a hydraulic fracture from the injection borehole towards the artificial fault. The newly generated fluid pathway resulted in an activation of the complete block through a stick–slip movement. We compare acoustic emission measurements from the laboratory experiment with seismicity observations from the field-scale CO2 injection at Decatur, Illinois, U.S., and conclude that the existence of fluid pathways plays a decisive role for the potential of induced seismicity.
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U2 - 10.1038/s41598-022-11715-6
DO - 10.1038/s41598-022-11715-6
M3 - Article
C2 - 35570215
AN - SCOPUS:85130051118
SN - 2045-2322
VL - 12
JO - Scientific reports
JF - Scientific reports
IS - 1
M1 - 8015
ER -