A Hot Dry Rock (HDR) geothermal energy development project has been conducted by Geodynamics Limited (GDY) at Cooper Basin in South Australia since 2002. The project site was selected where high temperature granite locates at relatively shallower depth estimated by the temperature distribution map and the seismic reflection and the gravity survey results. A water injection well, Habanero 1, was drilled to a depth of 4,421m where a temperature was measured around 250 degree C.
The authors conducted the electromagnetic surveys around Habanero 1 to evaluate the underground resistivity structure through the collaboration with GDY. Joint inversion analysis of the CSAMT and TDEM methods showed that a relatively high resistivity zone of tens to 100 ohm-m locates at shallower than tens m and below this depth very low resistivity formations of a few ohm-m continue to a depth of about 5km. These low resistivity formations are considered to be caused by high salinity water in the formation pores. At the Jolokia site located 10 km west of Habanero 1, the similar resistivity structure was analyzed by the TDEM method. Therefore the almost same underground structure extends widely in Cooper Basin. These resistivity structures will be used as reference structures for evaluating water distribution when large volume of water will be injected into the granite to extract heat energy from the granite in the future.
In 2003, hydraulic stimulation operations were performed to create artificial HDR reservoirs in Habanero 1 with injecting water at a maximum well-head pressure of 64 MPa and a total volume of 20,000 ton. During these operations, the authors observed AE (acoustic emission) events which are considered to be occurred with fractures progression. These fractures compose HDR reservoirs. More than 10,000 AE events were detected and 4,987 of them were located. Hypocenter locations of these events distributed southern area from Habanero 1 at first, and then the distribution spread north-east. According to the hypocenter distribution, Habanero 2, 3, and 4 were drilled as production wells to penetrate the created reservoirs. These three wells were hydraulically connected to Habanero 1 successfully. However, Habanero 2 and 3 were abandoned by stacking drilling tools and casing problems. Water circulation between Habanero 1 and Habanero 4 through the reservoir was successfully conducted and produced electricity of 1 MW in 2013.
The geophysical exploration methods have contributed to develop geothermal energy in Australia.
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