Using Surface Waters for Supplementing Injection at the Salton Sea Geothermal Field (SSGF), Southern California
- Key words
- Reinjection; Brine; Power Generation; USA; California; Salton Sea; Make Up Water; Injection; Suspended Solids; Dilution; Cooling Water; Reservoir Plugging; Two Flash Cycle
- Location
- Salton Sea, California; Imperial Valley
- Conference
- Geothermal Resources Council Transactions
- Year
- 1979
- Session
- Injection; Surface water; Flash steam power generation; Rech
- Language
- English
Abstract
The flash steam conversion cycle is most suitable for electric power production at the SSGF. However, large scale development of the SSGF may require use of makeup water supplements to injected brine for a viable reservoir pressure maintenance program. Since steam condensate will probably be required to satisfy power plant cooling needs, local surface waters have been evaluated for their potential use as sources of injection makeup. We found that direct injection of untreated makeup water is not feasible because of high suspended solids loading and potential incompatibility problems. However, mixtures of ambient temperature makeup water and higher temperature (80-90°C) brine effluent in a 1:4 mass ratio, are potentially injectable following processing by reaction clarification and granular media filtration.
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