Quantification of Effective Permeability Uncertainty Estimation on Geothermal Aquifer Scale

The economic extraction of energy from geothermal systems and hydrocarbon reservoirs rely largely on production rates, which in turn is largely reliant on the permeability. The effective permeability of a reservoir is often inconsistent with the local (borehole) permeability leading to high rate of economic failures. This mismatch is caused by heterogeneities related to e.g. permeability contrasts, faulting and other types of low permeable barriers such as lateral facies changes, these are notoriously hard to capture in permeability estimation.

This study empirically tests several analytical methods to estimate the effective permeability on a production system scale for a suite of geological facies and permeability distributions representative for the Netherlands deep subsurface. Ultimately we construct a toolbox of optimal techniques for determining the accuracy and precision distribution for permeability for a suite of genetically related reservoir types. Thereby allowing a significantly improved estimation of effective permeability and subsequently derisking pre- and postdrill evaluations of both geothermal and hydrocarbon projects.