TY - DATA AB - The vast supply of geothermal energy stored throughout the Earth and the exceedingly long time required to dissipate that energy makes the world's geothermal energy supply nearly limitless. As such, this resource holds the potential to provide a large supply of the world's energy demands; however, like all natural resources, it must be utilized in an appropriate manner if it is to be sustainable. Understanding sustainable use of geothermal resources requires thorough characterization efforts aimed at better understanding subsurface properties. The goal of this work is to understand which critical subsurface properties exert the most influence on sustainable geothermal production as a means to provide targeted future resource characterization strategies. Borehole temperature and reservoir pressure data were analyzed to estimate reservoir thermal and hydraulic properties at an active geothermal site. These reservoir properties then served as inputs for an analytical model which simulated net power production over a 30-year period. The analytical model was used to conduct a sensitivity analysis to determine which parameters were most critical in constraining the sustainability of a geothermal reservoir. Modeling results reveal that the number of preferential flow pathways (i.e. fractures) used for heat transport provides the greatest impact on geothermal reservoir sustainability. These results suggest that early and pre-production geothermal reservoir exploration would achieve the greatest benefit from characterization strategies which seek to delineate the number of active flow pathways present in the system. AU - Patterson, Jeremy R. DB - Open Energy Data Initiative (OEDI) DP - Open EI | National Renewable Energy Laboratory DO - KW - geothermal KW - energy KW - hydrogeology KW - DTS KW - reservoir characterization KW - Nevada KW - Brady Hot Springs KW - borehole pressure KW - borehole temperature KW - distributed temperature sensing KW - PoroTomo KW - sustainability KW - sustainable use KW - subsurface properties KW - resorce KW - identification KW - assessment KW - production KW - characterization KW - temperature KW - pressure KW - thermal KW - hydraulic KW - properties KW - analytical KW - model KW - numerical KW - analysis KW - reservoir KW - sensitivity KW - flow paths KW - fractures KW - flow KW - pathways KW - preferential KW - heat KW - transport KW - parameters KW - simulation KW - power production LA - English DA - 2018/07/11 PY - 2018 PB - University of Wisconsin T1 - Understanding Constraints on Geothermal Sustainability Through Reservoir Characterization at Brady Geothermal Field, Nevada UR - https://data.openei.org/submissions/ ER -