Geological storage of CO2 in deep saline aquifers is an option for significantly reducing emissions into the atmosphere. In November 2005, participants at a Workshop on Geological Storage of CO2 at Princeton University agreed on the need for a common test problem to assess various models for simulating the fate of CO2 injected into the subsurface. The Alberta Geological Survey offered to make available the data for the Wabamun Lake area in Alberta, Canada, that were assembled for the purpose of developing a comprehensive model for studying CO2 geological storage.
The Wabamun Lake area, southwest of Edmonton in central Alberta, was selected by AGS because a variety of favourable conditions identify it is a potential site for future, large-scale CO2 injection. Several large, industrial CO2 point sources are located in the vicinity, resulting in short transportation distances of the captured gas. Various deep-saline formations with sufficient capacity to accept and store large volumes of CO2 in supercritical phase exist at the appropriate depth and are overlain by thick, confining shale units. Most importantly, a wealth of data exist (i.e., stratigraphy, rock properties, mineralogy, fluid composition, formation pressure, information about well completions, etc.), which were collected by the petroleum industry and submitted to the provincial regulatory agency the Energy Resources Conservation Board. For these reasons, the Wabamun Lake area is an ideal location for the comprehensive characterization of a CO2 storage site and for analyzing the potential risks associated with such an operation.
