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Artistic presentation of the Seismicity from the Berlin Geothermal field, El Salvador

The GEISER project stands for Geothermal Engineering Integrating Mitigation of Induced Seismicity in Reservoirs. It started at the beginning of the 2010 after successful contract negotiations with the European Commission. EC funding of € 5.3 Mio was granted for 3.5 years. The project addressed several of the major challenges the development of geothermal energy is facing, including the mitigation of induced seismicity to an acceptable level.

The specific goals of GEISER were:

  • to understand why seismicity is induced in some cases but not in others,
  • to assess the probability of seismic hazards depending on geological setting and geographical location,
  • to propose licensing and monitoring guidelines for local authorities, including a definition acceptable ground motion levels,
  • to investigate strategies for soft stimulation that sufficiently improve the geothermal reservoir’s hydraulic properties without producing earthquakes that could be felt or cause damage

The project was coordinated by GFZ and involved 12 additional partners. GEISER was divided into 6 work packages including Compilation of induced seismicity data from geothermal sites,  Analysis of Induced Seismicity, Understanding the Geomechanical Causes and Processes of Induced Seismicity, Seismic Hazard Assessment, (Strategies for EGS operations with respect to Induced Seismicity (Mitigation) and (Dissemination.

My contribution

Between 2010 and 2012 I was involved in GEISER Work Package 3: Analysis of Induced Seismicity, where different seismological approaches has been applied and further developed to analyse data sets of induced microseismicity from geothermal areas. During this time I analyzed microseismic data from Berlin (El Salvador) and The Geysers (California, USA) geothermal fields.

During GEISER, I published the following papers:

Peer-reviewed articles:

  • Charalampidou, E.-M., Stanchits, S., Kwiatek, G., and G. Dresen (2014). Brittle failure and fault reactivation in sandstone by fluid injection, European Journal of Environmental and Civil Engineering, 1-16, DOI: 10.1080/19648189.2014.896752. [ Article Page ]
  • Martínez-Garzón, P., Bohnhoff, M., Kwiatek, G., Zambrano-Narváez, G., and R. Chalaturnyk (2013). Microseismic monitoring of CO2 injection at the Pen West enhanced oil recovery pilot project, Canada: Implications for detection of wellbore leakage. Sensors 13 (9), 11522-11538, DOI: 10.3390/s130911522 [ Article Page ] [ Download full Text ]
  • Kwiatek, G., Bulut, F., Bohnhoff, M., and G. Dresen (2013). High-resolution analysis of seismicity induced at Berlín geothermal field, El Salvador. Geothermics. DOI: 10.1016/j.geothermics.2013.09.008 [ Article Page ]
  • Kwiatek, G., Bohnhoff, M., Martínez-Garzón, P., Bulut, F. and G. Dresen (2013). High-resolution reservoir characterization using induced seismicity and state of the art waveform processing techniques. First Break 31 (7), 81-88. [ Article Page ]
  • Martínez-Garzón, P., Bohnhoff, M., and G. Kwiatek (2013). Stress tensor changes related to fluid injection at The Geysers Geothermal Field, California. Geophys. Res. Letters. 40, 2596-2601, DOI: 10.1002/grl.50438. [ Article Page ]

Selected conference materials:

  • Kwiatek, G., F. Bulut, M. Bohnhoff, and G. Dresen (2013). High-Resolution Analysis of Microseismicity Related to Hydraulic Stimulation in the Berlín geothermal field, El Salvador, in Proceedings of 4th EAGE Passive Seismic Workshop, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. [ Download presentation ]
  • Kwiatek, G., F. Bulut, M. Bohnhoff , and G. Dresen (2012). High-resolution analysis of seismicity induced at Berlín geothermal fi eld, El Salvador. Abstract S43E-2518 presented at 2012 Fall Meeting, AGU, San Francisco, Calif., 3-7 Dec. [ Download poster ]
  • Martínez-Garzón, P., M. Bohnhoff , and G. Kwiatek (2012). Relation between crustal stress field changes and fluid injection at The Geysers geothermal fi eld, California. Abstract S43E-2511 presented at 2012 Fall Meeting, AGU, San Francisco, Calif., 3-7 Dec. [ Download poster ]
  • G. Kwiatek, F. Bulut, M. Bohnhoff , and G. Dresen. High-resolution analysis of seismicity induced at Berlin geothermal fi eld, El Salvador. In Geophys. Res. Abstr. 14, EGU2012-2235. European Geosciences Union, 2012. [ Download poster ]

See my also full publication list.