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Title: |
Thermo-Mechanical Effects on Flow Channeling in Single- and Multi-Fracture Enhanced Geothermal Systems |
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Authors: |
Yujie LIU, Hui WU |
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Key Words: |
enhanced geothermal systems, multi-scale flow channeling, multi-fracture, fracture aperture |
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Conference: |
Stanford Geothermal Workshop |
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Year: |
2026 |
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Session: |
Enhanced Geothermal Systems |
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Language: |
English |
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Paper Number: |
Liu3 |
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File Size: |
1038 KB |
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View File: |
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Flow channeling is widely recognized as a key mechanism that accelerates thermal drawdown and degrades the long-term performance of enhanced geothermal systems (EGS). In addition to fracture-scale flow channeling, non-uniform flow rate allocation among fractures induced from wellbore-induced pressure loss and thermo-mechanical interactions between fractures can further complicate flow behavior in multi-fracture EGSs. To systematically investigate these coupled effects, we develop field-scale single- and double-fracture EGS models and simulate the fully coupled thermo-hydro-mechanical (THM) processes. Numerical simulations first reveal how injection flow rate governs thermo-mechanical responses and flow channeling within a single fracture. Low injection flow rates lead to localized cooling, strong thermal stress accumulation, and pronounced aperture heterogeneity, resulting in severe flow channeling. In contrast, high injection flow rates generate a broader cooling zone and reduce fracture stiffness over a larger area, producing more spatially distributed aperture evolution and relatively uniform fracture flow, despite faster thermal drawdown. Extending to the double-fracture system, wellbore pressure loss induces persistent asymmetric flow allocation, producing flow behavior in each fracture similar to that in single-fracture cases, while overlapping thermal perturbation zones between closely spaced fractures create strong inter-fracture thermo-mechanical coupling, synchronizing aperture evolution and enhancing flow redistribution.
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