Abstract

An understanding of fault seal is crucial for assessing the storage capacity and containment risks of CO₂ storage sites, as it can significantly affect the projects on across-fault and along-fault migration/leakage risk, as well as reservoir pressure predictions. We present a study from the Smeaheia area in the northern Horda Platform offshore Norway, focusing on two fault-bounded structural closures, namely the Alpha and Beta structures. We aim to use this study to improve the geological understanding of the northern Horda Platform for CO₂ storage scale-up potentials and illustrate the importance of fault seal analysis in containment risk assessment and storage capacity evaluation of a CO₂ storage project. Our containment risk assessment shows that the Alpha structure has low fault-related containment risks; thus, it has a potential value to be an additional storage target. The Beta structure shows larger fault-related containment risks due to juxtaposition of the prospective storage aquifer with the basement across the Øygarden Fault System. The storage capacity of Smeaheia will be determined by the long-term dynamic interplay between pressure depletion and recharging. Our study shows that across-fault pressure communication between Smeaheia and the depleting Troll reservoir is likely to be through several relay ramps of the Vette Fault System. However, Smeaheia also shows pressure-recharging potentials, such as through the subcropping areas at the Base Nordland Unconformity. The depletion observed in the newly drilled well 32/4-3S gives a good validation point for our fault seal predictions and provides valuable insights for future dynamic simulations.

Thematic collection: This article is part of the Geoscience for CO₂ storage collection available at: https://www.lyellcollection.org/cc/geoscience-for-co2-storage