Session: 11-09-02 Sustainability and Green Transition in Petroleum Industry

Paper Number: 131318

131318 - Thermal Performance Analysis of an Aquifer Thermal Energy Storage System in Multilateral Wells Based on Analytic Hierarchy Process and Fuzzy Comprehensive Evaluation 

    Aquifer thermal energy storage (ATES) is playing an increasingly important role in sustainable energy. It has been confirmed to be an effective method to mitigate environmental issues dealing with energy production and supply. Traditional ATES systems typically drill vertical wells, which limits the injection and production capabilities of the system. Our previous study proposed a novel system with multilateral wells. Branch boreholes drilled from the vertical wellbore can enhance the connectivity between the wellbore and the aquifer. The ATES system's operation and reservoir parameters significantly influence the thermal energy storage performance. Hence, it is necessary to analyze these influence factors comprehensively. However, the multi-objective evaluation index system of ATES has not been proposed yet. Regarding this problem, a three-dimensional numerical model of fluid flow and heat transfer for the multilateral-well ATES system is built with COMSOL and verified with experimental data. Then, the multilevel orthogonal tests are carried out to analyze 4 factors with 3 values. We propose an evaluation index system that includes the pumping temperature, the energy utilization coefficient and the coefficient of performance (COP). Their weight coefficients are determined by the analytic hierarchy process (AHP). Finally, an optimization model is built based on the fuzzy comprehensive evaluation (FCE) method. This study compares the performance of different construction plans and optimizes the parameters to obtain the optimal process scheme of multilateral-well ATES system. The results show that the optimized thermal energy storage method has a better effect than that before. The ideal parameters include an injection rate of 30 kg/s, radial branch length of 80 m, aquifer temperature of 25℃ and aquifer thickness of 40 m. The research results can provide a reference for the reasonable design of the ATES system.

Presenting Author: Shuang Li China University of Petroleum, Beijing

Presenting Author Biography: The author's name is Shuang Li, and his main research directions include: (1) Thermo-hydro-mechanical coupling model for geothermal exploitation; (2) Thermal energy storage characteristics of aquifer.

Authors:

Shuang Li China University of Petroleum, Beijing
Xianzhi Song China University of Petroleum, Beijing
Gaosheng Wang China University of Petroleum, Beijing
Junlin Yi China University of Petroleum, Beijing