¾ÅÉ«ÊÓƵ the project
When carbon dioxide (CO2) comes in contact with mafic to ultramafic rocks (e.g. basalt, peridotite), mineral dissolution and precipitation reactions produce carbonate minerals. This process provides a pathway by which CO2 can be removed from the atmosphere and permanently stored in the geologic subsurface.
Engineering this CO2 mineralization process has the potential to remove mega- to giga-tonnes of CO2 per year. To develop the full CO2 removal potential of these rocks, we must understand the fundamental processes of fluid flow and reactive transport of these fractured multi-scale rock systems, where permeability, porosity and reactive surface area are continually changing through time.
The principal aim of this project is:
- to examine how geo-chemo-mechanical processes affect the overall CO2 mineralisation capacity of basalts and peridotites; and
- to deliver physical and geochemical benchmark data for the development of a micro-scale mechanical model (pore scale) and an upscaled continuum model, the latter of which will be used to study and predict the chemo-hydraulic interactions between fractures and rock matrix during CO2 mineralisation.
For full project details .
Supervisors
- Professor Juerg Matter (¾ÅÉ«ÊÓƵ)
- Dr Ismael Falcon Suarez (National Oceanography Centre)
- Professor Joseph Labuz (University of Minnesota, USA)