At CaMI’s Field Research Station (FRS), we develop innovative solutions to one of the energy industry’s most critical challenges – tracking and monitoring underground fluids. With governments implementing new regulations for methane emissions and an increased focus on in-situ oil sands extraction, as well as growth in the carbon storage industry, operators in the petroleum industry are looking for ways to improve performance.

Schematic diagram for Containment and Monitoring Institute’s Field Research Station

CaMI’s Field Research Station (FRS) provides a unique opportunity to develop, refine and calibrate monitoring technologies and map out integrated monitoring systems.

The FRS program will be designed around small tonnages (up to 1000 tonnes per year) of CO₂ (possibly with small amounts of impurities such as CH₄ or other tracers) to be injected into the subsurface at a depth of approximately 300 m. The injection targets are water filled sandstones within Upper Cretaceous clastic reservoir formations, with overlying shales or mixed sand/shale sequences forming the cap rocks.

Site activities will focus on research and technology development as well as training in monitoring technologies. Geophysical, geochemical, geomechanical and geodetic monitoring of the subsurface gas plume (both CO₂ and methane) will be complemented by near-surface hydrogeological studies to better understand shallow groundwater systems, near-surface subsurface fluid flow, and to establish the fate of both CO₂ and CH₄ in an aquifer below ~225 m depth, which is the local base of groundwater protection.

Partners sought

Researchers from industry, from academia, and from the CMC Network of researchers across Canada and internationally will be able to take part in research at the site with various access protocols. CMC is inviting partners to join in this collaborative development exercise with partnership offered via sponsorship; contract R&D arrangements and by other collaboration mechanisms. Applications at the site include:

• Secure carbon storage (CCS)
• Steam chamber containment and effectiveness
• Tertiary/Enhanced petroleum recovery
• Characterization of hydraulic or natural fractures
• Groundwater protection
• New or legacy well construction/abandonment issues and fugitive emissions
• Acid gas or other fluid disposal
• Induce seismicity risk analysis and mitigation

For more details about CaMI and the FRS click here.

For a PowerPoint presentation on the Field Research Station click here.

To speak to someone about CaMI or the FRS contact CaMI Director Dr. Don Lawton at 403 210-6671 or by email at don.lawton@cmcghg.com

Mobile Geochemistry Laboratory

In today’s world, it is critical that reports of leaks in conventional and unconventional oil and gas operations be investigated as quickly as possible.

CaMI’s Mobile Geochemistry Laboratory allows for rapid, field-based gas and water testing so clients have results in hours instead of days or weeks.

The laboratory’s state-of-the art equipment will detect and analyze atmospheric, casing and soil gases including CH₄, CO₂, H₂S, N₂ and O₂. Other capabilities include groundwater, surface water and produced fluid sampling and analysis, as well as isotope fingerprinting.

The laboratory can be transported and used in numerous locations:

• Geological CO2 storage sites;
• Shale gas and shale oil development sites;
• Oil sands sites; and
• Many more.

For more information contact Kirk Osadetz at kirk.osadetz@cmcghg.com or call 403 210-7108.

The Field Research Station is the only site in the world where measurement and monitoring technologies can be tested on a CO₂ plume at the shallow depth of 300 metres. National and international clients are implementing a number of projects. Below are highlights:

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Surface to borehole electromagnetic survey

Client: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Summary: The surface-to-borehole electromagnetic survey will use CaMI’s recently purchased electrical resistivity tomography array and Lawrence Berkeley Lab’s own downhole equipment to map the background resistivity structure and the CO₂ plume.

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Borehole fibre optic survey

Client: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Summary: Lawrence Berkeley Labs will design and deploy an integrated fibre optic cable capable of distributed heat pulse testing, as well as distributed temperature and acoustic sensing measurements. Heat pulse testing will be used to make high-resolution spatial measurements along the length of the borehole including reservoir injection zones and will be used to inferred flow and CO2 distributions in the monitoring well.

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Seismic crosswell survey

Client: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Summary: Seismic crosswell is the geometry of seismic acquisition using a minimum of two boreholes to probe the inter-well region. At the FRS, equipment in two monitoring wells will be used to problem the inter-well region in order to image the CO2 plume. Crosswell technology has a higher spatial resolution that other seismic methods which should make the plume easier to see.

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Broadband seismometer testing

Client: University of Bristol
Summary: Seven broadband seismometers have been installed at distances ranging from 200 metres to three kilometers from the Field Research Station’s injection well. The seismometers will run continuously for the next year with data used to map the underground structures in the area. The recordings will also provide baseline information on the naturally occurring background rate of seismic events in the area. This information will be compared to microseismic activity after injection starts in mid-2016 to determine which events are the result of injection operations and which are natural.

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Downhole vertical seismic profiling

Client: University of Calgary
Summary: University of Calgary Geophysics Professor David Eaton and a team of postdoctoral researchers and students were trained on the installation and operation of a microseismic system (ESG Solutions’ SuperCable borehole monitoring system).

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3D time-lapse seismic data tool testing

Client: British Geological Survey

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Observations of relative permeability and residual trapping from core-flood measurements at reservoir conditions on core samples

Client: Imperial College London

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Noble gas analysis of subsurface samples

Client: University of Edinburgh

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CMC-funded research

Between 2010 and 2012 CMC Research Institutes distributed $22 million to 44 research projects across Canada. Sixteen of these projects focused on development of the monitoring, measurement and verification technologies. Click Here to read about these research projects.