Collaborative Research: EAGER: A New Approach to the Analysis of the Risk of Hydrofracking Fluid Migration from Unconventional Shales to Groundwater Reservoirs

水平水力压裂技术的进步，加上对大量非常规页岩资源的勘探，导致了一场迅速超越阿巴拉契亚地区经济的能源热潮。不幸的是，页岩开发活动的发展速度正在推动新的监管政策，而这些技术可能对水资源可持续性产生不利影响。水力压裂流体的生物、物理和化学性质将决定它们与孔隙结构和地层流体的相互作用。了解这些液体的命运和寿命对于我们理解这些活动对饮用水供应的风险至关重要。本研究旨在更好地表征非常规页岩开发相关流体的生物物理化学性质，建立基于风险的流体流动输运模型，求解其在地下的时空分布。研究人员将研究压裂和反排流体的物理特性和生物降解潜力，并测量非常规页岩和周围地层岩心的控制物理特性，以量化描述流体如何在介质中移动的本构关系。研究人员将结合实验得出的性质、行业知识和概率裂缝导流率，制定一个基于风险的流动和输送模型，能够预测流体从页岩地层到地下水含水层的运动。这项研究将有助于量化在可预见的时间框架内，发生在深层的水力压裂过程可能迁移到较浅的地下水含水层，为工业、商业或家庭供水。如果压裂液化合物从非常规页岩地层中提取出来，它还可以让我们深入了解压裂液化合物在地下环境中可以存在多长时间。通过将实验得出的性质与专家知识和运移建模方法相结合，这项研究将促进我们对能源开发活动中使用的流体性质的理解，并为从业者提供一种新的工具来评估一系列水文地质情景下的运移风险。在这个项目中进行的研究将通过参加扩展会议和正在进行的关于阿巴拉契亚地区页岩能源开发的讲习班论坛，向广泛的利益攸关方进行宣传。

1247338/1247437Mouser/PinderAdvancements in horizontal hydraulic fracturing technologies combined with the exploration of vast unconventional shale resources have led to an energy boom that is rapidly transcending economics of the Appalachian region. Unfortunately, shale development activities are progressing at a rate that is driving new regulatory policies before the possible detrimental effects of these techniques on water resource sustainability are understood. The biological, physical, and chemical properties of the hydrofracking fluids will govern their interaction with pore structures and formation fluids. Understanding the fate and longevity of these fluids is critical to framing our understanding of the risks of these activities to potable water supplies. The objective of this research is to better characterize the biophysiochemical properties of fluids relevant to unconventional shale development, and formulate a risk-based flow and transport model for solving their spatiotemporal distribution in the subsurface. The investigators will examine the physical properties and biodegradability potential of fracking and flowback fluids, and measure the governing physical characteristics of rock cores from unconventional shale and surrounding formations in order to quantitate the constitutive relationships that describe how fluids move through media. The investigators will combine experimentally-derived properties with industry knowledge and a probabilistic fracture hydraulic conductivity to formulate a risk-based flow and transport model capable of predicting fluid movement from shale formations to groundwater aquifers. This research will help quantify the likelihood that hydrofracking processes occurring at depth could migrate to shallower groundwater aquifers that serve industrial, commercial, or domestic water supplies within a foreseeable time frame. It should also provide insight into how long the fracking fluid compounds would persist in the subsurface environment if they were mobilized from the unconventional shale formations. By integrating experimentally-derived properties with expert knowledge and a transport modeling approach, this research will both advance our understanding of fluid properties used during energy development activities and provide a new tool for practitioners to assess migration risk under a range of hydrogeologic scenarios. The research undertaken in this project will be communicated to a broad range of stakeholders through participation in extension meetings and ongoing workshop forums on shale energy development in the Appalachian region.