Modeling regional faults for land subsidence prediction
M. Ferronato, G. Gambolati, P. Teatini
Dept. Mathematical Methods and Models for Scientific
Applications, University of Padova, Padova, Italy
ABSTRACT
The aim of the present communication is to investigate some aspects of the
role exerted by active faults in anthropogenic land subsidence over a regional
scale. The importance of regional faults depends on a variety of factors
including depth of the depleted reservoir, fault orientation and size,
geomechanical properties of porous medium, pore pressure drawdown induced by
fluid production, etc. A few examples of faulted reservoirs are studied and
discussed with the aid of a poroelastic finite element (FE) model specifically
designed to address the fault mechanics over the macro-scale of interest. The
results, although preliminary, provide a useful indication as to where and how
fault activation can influence magnitude and extent of the land subsidence
bowl above producing gas/oil reservoirs and point to a limited influence of
the faults on the main occurrence.
