New drilling activities at the In-Situ Laboratory

CSIRO and RITE are starting a new field demonstration project at the ISL research facility aiming at investigating the behaviour of fault systems and distributed fibre optic sensing monitoring in the context of CCUS projects.

As part of these new activities, the partners will drill two wells. The first well drilled will be a deviated geophysical monitoring well instrumented with 2 highly specialized fibre optic sensing cables for measuring temperature and strain. The drilling operations will start on 26th February and are expected to end prior to 31st March. This deviated well will intersect the F10 fault and a water interference test will be run within the fault zone to assess structure and permeability. Following the outcomes of this well, a second injector well is planned for next summer.

The project aims to assess how the internal structure of the fault can affect fluid and pressure communication as well as evaluating how distributed fibre optic sensing, especially strain sensing, can identify fluid flow in the subsurface.