Chombo-Crunch: Advanced Simulation of Subsurface Flow and Reactive Transport Processes Associated with Carbon Sequestration

PI David Trebotich, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Transient pH on calcite grains in capillary tube experiment. 1 billion grid points computed on 48K cores. 1 micron resolution.
Project Description

Carbon sequestration, the process of capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) before it enters the atmosphere and transferring it into the earth, is a promising technology to help reduce greenhouse gases and attenuate climate change. Key to the realization of geologic sequestration of CO2 are new investigative tools for understanding molecular-to-pore-scale processes in fluid-rock systems in order to control critical aspects of flow and transport in porous rock media. One important investigative tool is simulation of reactive transport processes in realistic pore space obtained from image data of CO2 injection experiments. We have developed multiscale, multiphysics simulation tools in the Chombo software framework for high-performance simulation capability of flow and transport in complex micro-scale geometries obtained from image data. This technology has been successfully combined with the complex geochemistry module of CrunchFlow to deliver high performance flow and reactive transport modeling in synthetic and realistic packed bed systems. The new capability, called Chombo-Crunch, will enable simulations of the image data problem at realistic time scales and at better than image data grid resolution. The successful completion of these simulations will validate and inform the experiments a priori and aid experimental interpretation for future developments in geologic carbon sequestration.

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