Authors:

Jordan Sexton

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About Paper:

Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) represent the future of geothermal energy production because of the potential to harvest geothermal energy in more regions and generate electricity at greater rates than traditional geothermal systems. EGS differentiates itself from traditional systems by utilizing fractures within underground rocks to provide the necessary flow paths to transfer heat to fluids to generate electricity. The geometry and connectivity of the fractures directly correlate to the electrical generation capacity of EGS. The Center for Understanding Subsurface Signals and Permeability (CUSSP) group aims to characterize fractures found in EGS for predicting the behavior of subsurface fractures under varying conditions. CUSSP is currently analyzing experiments (EGS Collab) run at Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) where geophysical monitoring was used to characterize the geometry and changes in subsurface fractures. CUSSP aims to utilize simulation software, such as Seismic Waves, 4th Edition (SW4), to generate synthetic seismic data to compare to data collected at SURF to verify the spatial distribution of fractures interpreted from the field data. This project aims to explore the applications of SW4 within CUSSP's goals by testing various simulations representing the EGS Collab experiments. Simulations were conducted with SW4 using material and water interfaces and fractures with geometries and materials representative of the SURF site. After matching the seismic data, CUSSP plans to use SW4's fracture manipulation capabilities to predict the seismic signals of the fractures at SURF for various physical conditions, such as high and low fluid pressures, changing interface geometry, and thermal gradients. Keywords: Geophysics; Simulation; Fractures

Source:

Purdue University / 2025

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Co-authors:

Jordan Sexton