The rotation of the principal stress axes in a fault structure because of a rock stiffness contrast has been investigated for the impact of the ratio of principal stresses, the angle between principal stress axes and fault strike, and the ratio of the rock stiffness contrast. A generic 2D geomechanical model is employed for the systematic investigation of the parameter space.

This study developed new meshing workflows to enable the automatic generation of meshes that follow geological models. The workflow allows for importing several geological models as input for Gmsh and later exporting the same number of high-quality meshes. This way, geological uncertainty is directly included in the numerical simulations. This study evaluates the impact of the geological uncertainty on thermohydraulic performance of two reservoirs for high-temperature heat storage applications.

The physical processes leading to the kilometre-scale thermal anomaly in faulted tight sandstones are numerically investigated. The fluid-flow pathways, heat-transfer types and interactions among different convective and advective flow modes are systematically identified. The methodologies and results can be applied to interpret hydrothermal convection-related geological phenomena and to draw implications for future petroleum and geothermal exploration and exploitation in analogous settings.