Testing fracture mechanical properties of reservoir rocks for underground hydrogen storage

In-Person

BEG Building 130, VR Room 1.116C

Presenter

Dawid Gajda, PhD Engineering
Postdoctoral Fellow
Bureau of Economic Geology
Jackson School of Geosciences
The University of Texas at Austin

Description

Hydrogen is a low-carbon energy carrier that provides an alternative to natural gas for seasonal energy storage. Seasonal energy storage, conventionally provided using natural gas, is needed to balance variations in energy production and demand. Like natural gas, hydrogen can be transported in pipelines and stored in depleted oil and gas reservoirs, saline aquifers, and in salt caverns. While salt cavern storage of hydrogen is currently conducted for oil refining, hydrogen storage in oil and gas reservoirs and saline aquifers is untested at the commercial scale. For commercial deployment, hydrogen-specific aspects relating to storage safety and injection and production performance need to be evaluated.

Fractures can affect injection and production in porous storage reservoirs and create leakage pathways in shale caprock, salt, and wellbore cement. We investigate the fracture behavior of these rock types after exposure to and in the presence of hydrogen using double torsion fracture mechanics testing. This technique is uniquely suited to quantify chemical effects on fracture properties. This presentation will review results on sandstone, shale, and polycrystalline halite.