THREE-YEAR PHD PROJECTS
Seeking one candidate
Engineering PhD Studentships in Carbon Storage (bursary £18,000 pa, all fees included)
Supervisors: Sam Krevor
Start: October, 2014
CO2 Sequestration: Multiphase flow properties of the carbonate rock/water/CO2
system at various scales
The greatest scientific and technological challenge of this century is how to provide energy
to a growing global population, while avoiding dangerous climate change. The storage of
CO2 in deep subsurface geologic reservoirs is broadly recognized as essential for major
greenhouse gas emissions reductions, including assessments made by the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the Commission on European Communities,
and the United States Department of Energy.
The characteristic flow properties of the CO2-water system in porous media, including the
relative permeability, capillary pressure, and residual trapping, control such aspects of
geologic storage projects as maximal rates of CO2 injection, the spread of subsurface plumes,
and the long-term security of injected gas. At the same time, few observations have been
made of these properties at pressure, temperature, and flow conditions relevant to storage
in carbonate rocks.
The project will combine core-flood tests of these properties, with pore-scale observations
and modeling of fluid distributions under varying fluid property and pressure/temperature
conditions. The goal of this project is to utilize observations and modeling at the various
scales in developing useful generalizations about the linkages between pore-structure, fluid
properties, and macroscopic flow relationships useful for reservoir simulations. These
studies will be extended to investigate the impact of chemical processes such as matrix
dissolution, precipitation, CO2 dissolution, exsolution, and diffusion on flow properties as
per the progress and interests of the student.
The posts are funded through major long-term support from Qatar Petroleum and Shell
International for the Qatar Carbonates and Carbon Storage Research Centre (QCCSRC). This
Centre is enabling Imperial College London to expand its research into Clean Fossil Fuels
significantly - aimed in particular at improving the energy efficiency of oil and gas recovery,
closely coupled with reducing greenhouse gas emissions through advanced carbon capture
and storage technologies. The Centre is a collaboration between the Department of Earth
Science and Engineering and the Department of Chemical Engineering.
The successful applicants will be encouraged to collaborate with other QCCSRC team
members and other academic staff members, publish the research results in internationally
recognised peer reviewed journals and present the research results at relevant national and
international scientific and professional conferences, and sponsor meetings.
We are looking for students with an outstanding academic record in applied mathematics,
physical science or engineering. We have full funding for European Union and overseas
students.
Information about the research centre is available at the Department of Earth Science and
Engineering:
www.imperial.ac.uk/earthscienceandengineering
and the Department of Chemical Engineering:
http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/earthscienceandengineering
Figure 1. The medical CT in the multiscale imaging laboratory