Content
The modern exploration and energy technologies, such as production of unconventional oil and gas, geothermal operations, carbon capture, wastewater management and others, involve underground fluid injection.
In many cases such fluid injections are accompanied by induced seismicity. While potentially hazardous, induced seismicity might be used for monitoring purposes during fluid injection operations. For instance, micro-earthquakes during hydraulic fracturing might indicate the extent of the induced fracture. The natural analogs are related to volcanic systems: earthquake swarms and volcanic tremor. The better understanding these processes has a vital role both for the risk assessment linked to seismic activity and for revealing why and how the Earth’s lithosphere eventually deforms in response to tectonic stresses.
The project will address these questions through numerical mechanical modeling of rock deformation coupled to fluid flow and wave propagation.
Learning outcomes
The student will get theoretical and practical basis for solving advanced problems that arise in geophysics, geo-energy technologies and during geotechnical operations.
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