Geothermal Play Fairway Analysis for Low-Temperature Resources in the Denver Basin

Description

This dataset is part of an effort to highlight the advantages of incorporating low-temperature (< 150 C) geothermal resource evaluation into the implementation of combined heat and power (CHP), and geothermal direct use (GDU) technologies (e.g., space heating and/or cooling). For this Denver Basin example, resource favorability maps were created to identify potentially favorable areas for further geothermal exploration and are provided here. Favorability was based on three types of data: (1) geologic, (2) economic, and (3) risk. This raw data is also provided below. Geologic data include bottom-hole temperatures (BHT) from oil and gas wells, water co-production volumes from oil and gas wells, well groundwater levels, hot spring locations, temperatures, and chemistries, faults, and earthquakes. Economic feasibility data include population, thermal energy demand, infrastructure, and roads. Risk data (which includes data on excluded areas) include flood plains, protected lands (e.g. wildlife conservation areas, national parks). The included report describes this project in detail, covering workflows, relevant datasets, Python code, and both common and composite maps used to create low-temperature geothermal resource favorability maps for the Denver Basin, which extends across Colorado, Nebraska, and Wyoming. The figures in this report include: maps of the original datasets; maps of transformed data and derived parameters (such as the geothermal gradient or thermal conductivity); results of uncertainty analyses; results of data completeness (using the GeoRePORT tool); examples of the data combination and processing (using the geoPFA Python library, which is introduced in the attached report); favorability maps for each criteria; and a final combined favorability map. This project is designed to facilitate future deployment of CHP and GDU by providing data, tools, and a workflow applicable to low-temperature geothermal resources in sedimentary basins.

Resources

Name Format Description Link
57 Contains the raw spatial data used in the analysis, including groundwater levels, hot springs, O&G water coproduction, combined bottom hole temperature (BHT) datasets, earthquakes, faults, infrastructure, population, heating and cooling energy demand, flood plains, land exclusions, and habitat protection areas. https://gdr.openei.org/files/1671/Relevant%20Raw%20Data.zip
57 These maps are in PNG format and present the results of the uncertainty analysis of geothermal gradient. https://gdr.openei.org/files/1671/UncertaintyHeat_maps.zip
57 These geospatial vector files are the result of using the PFA workflow to compare results for a higher-temperature (i.e., power-producing) versus lower temperature (i.e., direct use) resource. More information on this investigation can be found in Appendix B of the attached report. https://gdr.openei.org/files/1671/Appendices.zip
33 This report, "Geothermal Play Fairway Analysis of Low-Temperature Resources for Sedimentary Basin Geothermal Play Types: An Example in the Denver Basin", covers the project in detail, referencing and describing the data provided in this archive. https://gdr.openei.org/files/1671/GeothermalPFALowTemp_DenverBasin.pdf
57 This collection contains maps of component, economic criteria, geologic criteria, safety criteria, and combined favorability. Each map is provided in standard GIS file formats. https://gdr.openei.org/files/1671/Favorability_Maps.zip

Tags

  • water-co-production
  • georeport
  • colorado
  • earthquakes
  • workflow
  • geospatial
  • economic-data
  • denver-basin
  • risk-data
  • hot-spring-locations
  • faults
  • geology
  • favorability
  • sedimentary-basin
  • python
  • geochemistry
  • pfa
  • resource-favoribility-maps
  • exploration
  • low-temperature
  • geopfa
  • geologic-data
  • groundwater-levels
  • geothermal
  • energy
  • thermal
  • economic-feasibility
  • play-fairway-analysis

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