Evaluating Carbon Storage in Morrowan and Mississippian oil fields and Underlying Lower Ordovician Arbuckle Saline Aquifer in Southern Kansas

Watney, Willard L.; Rush, Jason; Dubois, Martin K.; Barker, Robinson L.; Birdie, Tiraz; Cooper, Ken; Datta, Saugata; Doveton, John; Fazelalavi, Mina; Fowle, David; Gerlach, Paul; Hansen, Thomas; Hedke, Dennis E.; Holubnyak, Yevhen; Huff, Breanna; Newell, K. David; Nicholson, Larry; Roberts, Jennifer; Scheffer, Aimee; Sirazhiev, Ayrat; Sorenson, Raymond P.; Tsoflias, Georgios; Williams, Eugene; Wreath, Dana; Youle, John

Kansas currently has no large scale source of CO2 available to support an active CCUS industry, yet oil fields in Kansas offer substantial reserves potentially recoverable by CO2-EOR (~ 2 billion bbls). Oil fields in southern Kansas also overlie a deep (>1200 m), thick (150 to 300 m) Arbuckle saline aquifer that could greatly increase CO2 storage capacity in these fields. Operation of overlying fields could also serve to monitor, verify, and account (MVA) for CO2 that is injected and aid in achieving cost-effective management of commercial scale CO2 storage (10's millions of metric tons) in the saline aquifer while reducing uncertainty.

A multi-disciplinary investigation funded by DOE and cost share from industry partners is evaluating the CO2 storage capacity in five oil fields and establishing regional storage capacity of the deep saline Arbuckle aquifer. Regional 3-D seismic, digital well logs, potential fields, and remote sensing data are being used to build geomodels and conduct simulations at additional sites potentially best suited for commercial scale CO2 storage. Together field and site studies will serve to calibrate the regional model.

CO2 will be injected on a small scale in a Mississippian reservoir and the underlying Arbuckle saline aquifer in one of these fields, Wellington Field, Sumner County, Kansas. Drilling, coring, and seismic acquisition in Wellington and more recently at Cutter Field in Stevens County, Kansas has added new information about the complex hydrostratigraphic units that comprise the Arbuckle and characteristics of the overlying caprock. Geomodeling and reservoir simulations of Morrow and Chester sandstone reservoirs in southwestern Kansas, and the Osage-Meramec dolomitic chert reservoir at Wellington Field are focused on evaluating the efficacy of CO2-EOR. This extended knowledge is being applied to gain a Class VI permit to inject CO2 into the Arbuckle at Wellington Field. The information obtained and methodologies applied in the CO2-EOR projects will assist industry in implementing optimal carbon management. Combining the oil field and underlying saline aquifer will help to minimize uncertainty and risk aided by the knowledge gained from field development and the fact that the accumulation of oil attest to the integrity of overlying sealing strata.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90163©2013AAPG 2013 Annual Convention and Exhibition, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, May 19-22, 2013