The Salar de Uyuni, a salt pan located in the Bolivian Andes, was subject to hydrogeological and hydrochemical investigations between June and September 2009. During a drilling and sampling campaign halite cores were gained from different bore holes with depths between 2 and 12 m at two locations in the north eastern and the central part of the Salar (named SLT-01 and SLT-03, respectively). Bri...

Krembs et al. (1) reported that extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) produced by a sea ice diatom, Melosira, created convoluted ice-pore morphologies in sea ice, potentially increasing its habitability and primary productivity. The activity was reduced by heat treatment and glycosidase treatments, suggesting that a glycoprotein was involved. Based on our previous work (2), it is very likely...

In recent years, the Lattice Boltzmann (LB) method has become a powerful numerical tool for simulating complex fluid flows and modeling physics and chemistry in fluids. Derived from the continuum Boltzmann equation used in statistical mechanics, the LB method has the advantage of describing non-equilibrium dynamics, especially in fluid-flow applications involving interfacial dynamics and comple...

Geologic CO2 storage has been identified as a key to avoiding dangerous climate change. Storage in oil reservoirs dominates the portfolio of existing projects due to favorable economics. However, in an earlier related work ( Al-Menhali and Krevor Environ. Sci. Technol. 2016 , 50 , 2727 - 2734 ) , it was identified that an important trapping mechanism, residual trapping, is weakened in rocks wit...

This paper discusses a new nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) method that can provide wettability, saturation, and oil viscosity values in rocks partially saturated with oil and brine. The method takes advantage of two new technological advances in NMR well logging — the MRF Magnetic Resonance Fluid Characterization Method and NMR “diffusion-editing” (DE) pulse sequences. We discuss the principle...

The Forward Osmosis Brine Drying (FOBD) system is based on a technique called forward osmosis (FO). FO is a membrane-based process where the osmotic potential between brine and a salt solution is equalized by the movement of water from the brine to the salt solution. The FOBD system is composed of two main elements, the FO bag and the salt regeneration system. This paper discusses the results o...

A pore-scale model based on the lattice Boltzmann (LB) method is developed for multiphase reactive transport with phase transitions and dissolution-precipitation processes. The model combines the single-component multiphase Shan-Chen LB model [X. Shan and H. Chen, Phys. Rev. E 47, 1815 (1993)], the mass transport LB model [S. P. Sullivan et al., Chem. Eng. Sci. 60, 3405 (2005)], and the dissolu...

We perform single-phase and two-phase flooding on Edwards Brown rock samples. The injection was of seawater or CaCl2 brine, at successive salinities 0.63, 0.21, 0.07, 0.05, 0 mol/L (distilled water). For brine experimental run, no significant fines migration permeability decrease is observed. distilled water found to bring about the highest concentration produced most decrease, with ultimate be...

Based on the engineering background of water dissolving mining for hydrocarbon storage in multi-laminated salt stratum, the mixed mode fracture toughness and fracture trajectory of gypsum interlayers soaked in half-saturated brine at various temperatures (20°C, 50°C and 80°C) were studied by using CSNBD (centrally straight-notched Brazilian disc) specimens with required inclination angles (0°, ...

Injecting and storing of carbon dioxide (CO2) in deep geologic formations is considered as one of the promising approaches for geologic carbon storage. Microbial wettability alteration of injected CO2 is expected to occur naturally by microorganisms indigenous to the geologic formation or microorganisms intentionally introduced to increase CO2 storage capacity in the target reservoirs. The ques...