Numerical Prediction of Gas Breakthrough in Boom Clay

Abstract

In Belgium, Boom clay has been studied as a potential host rock for storage of high-level radioactive waste. This work aims at the numerical prediction of gas migration properties in the very low-porosity formation of Boom clay. Considering the meso/microscopic scale of pore network, the analyses based on macroscopic approaches or homogeneous transport properties are no longer appropriate. In this study, the 3D pore space morphological model of Boom clay which possesses a similar pore size distribution (PSD) with experimental results is generated through the union of excursions of Gaussian random fields. Essentially, the extraction of accessible pores for a given gas pressure is feasible via the purely geometric analysis of morpho-mathematical operations. Then this work numerically predicts the capillary induced gas entry and gas breakthrough pressures (GEP and GBP) in Boom clay.