Surveillance monitoring technology enables effective injection projects by accurately capturing the physical properties of the subsurface that impact injection. Without proper monitoring and planning, fluid injection into the subsurface can lead to adverse effects, including fault reactivation or microseismic events, out of zone injection, or even fracturing into the overburden. Subsurface data enables model calibration and inclusion of complexity that can accurately explain and constrain these multifaceted systems, helping to design reliable storage systems for CO2 injection. A range of surveillance technologies are needed to adequately monitor the subsurface for proper characterization of the effectiveness of long-term storage in CCUS reservoirs and deliver innovations for increasing efficiency. As learnings are captured and innovations grow, utilization of the surveillance technologies will evolve and possibly be more selective.
Core measurements of depletion and injection cycles are needed to build models that accurately represent hysteresis or plastic deformation. Enhanced physical property models improve the understanding of the potential to inject into a reservoir without any adverse subsurface effects. Data from Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) and Pressure Monitor Transponders (PMTs) are useful to constrain model deformation and to identify deformation due to out of zone injection and fault reactivation. Microseismic is critical for monitoring injection in fractured and faulted fields. 4D seismic can be used to monitor CO2 plume migration, but it is also useful for identifying strain responses associated with overburden fracturing and fault reactivation. Electromagnetic data can also be used to understand out of zone injection. Wellbore monitoring, including DAS/DTS/DSS/DPS, helps to understand cement integrity and long-term storage viability. CO2 leak detection technology at the wellbore and the field scale ensures reliability of the system. The gamut of surveillance technologies enables perspectives from the well scale to the regional scale and helps to uncover the subsurface complexities that inhibit efficiency and storage capacity.
