Process Modelling of Hydrothermal Systems using SHEMAT
Hydrothermal systems are the engines that fuel geothermal fields and are of great significance for the generation of the world’s hydrocarbon and mineral resources. Adequate and reliable supplies of affordable energy, obtained in environmentally sustainable ways, are essential to economic prosperity, environmental quality, and political stability around the world.The challenge for geological exploration is to find cost-effective ways of locating high quality geothermal and mineral resources. Numerical simulation of reactive transport is an emerging exploration tool, which can provide a more quantitative exploration effort.The focus of the course ‘Process Modelling of Hydrothermal Systems’ is on coupled numerical simulations of fluid flow, heat transfer, multi species transport and chemical reactions and how these processes relate to rock deformation and geodynamics. 
The physical and chemical foundations as well as the philosophy of how to conceptualise, set up and carry out numerical modelling projects are discussed and demonstrated. ‘Process Modelling of Hydrothermal Systems’ is a hands-on course, designed for industry practitioners, university researchers, and students interested in the simulation of fluid flow and reactive transport in hydrogeology, geothermal energy and economic geology. ‘Process Modelling of Hydrothermal Systems’ will provide an overview of existing simulation techniques with an emphasis on coupled simulations using the program package SHEMAT / Processing SHEMAT. SHEMAT (Simulator for HEat and MAss Transport) is an easy-to-use, general purpose reactive transport simulation code for a wide variety of thermal and hydrogeological problems in two and three dimensions.

Kursaufbau:
The course is structured into 6 lectures accompanied by 5 practical exercises. First a general overview will be given on modelling hydrothermal systems for mineral exploration, geothermal energy production and CO2 sequestration. Then basic physical processes involved in hydrothermal systems -- heat transfer, fluid flow driving processes, deformation and reactive transport -- will be reviewed. Practical exercises will introduce the application of the software package SHEMAT / Processing SHEMAT to solve relevant problems with regard to hydrothermal systems. The final part of the course will address the use of coupled reactive transport models for hypotheses testing.

Zielgruppe:
Geophysicists, geologists, geochemists and hydrogeologists from industry, universities and governmental institutions interested in processes and simulation techniques of hydrogeological, geothermal and reactive transport applications. Post-graduate students specialising in one of the mentioned fields. All users of the program package SHEMAT / Processing SHEMAT.

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