While fractured porous formations constitute an important class of geothermal reservoirs, a generally applicable methodology for accurately describing their performance has yet to appear in. the literature. As a preliminary step in our attempt to unravel the fundamental physical principles involved in fractured media simulation, we herein describe an elementary yet interesting numerical experiment. A porous media block containing superheated steam is suddenly enclosed by reinjection water of lower enthalpy. The objectives of the experiment are 1) to examine the response of the porous block to reinjection and 2) to study the influence of block geometry on the simulated behavior. The numerical experiments are conducted using a one-dimensional multiphase (steamwater) model. With the model defined in Cartesian coordinates, we investigate a porous block delimited by two parallel fractures of infinite extent: the model defined in radial coordinates is employed to examine a cylindrical geometry. The reservoir parameters and reinjection water properties are chosen to be representative of those encountered in The Geysers geothermal field in California.

Press the Back button in your browser, or search again.

Copyright 1979, Stanford Geothermal Program: Readers who download papers from this site should honor the copyright of the original authors and may not copy or distribute the work further without the permission of the original publisher.