Mary-Louise Hoffman
A Battelle-led consortium has been chosen by the U.S. Energy Department to help study the feasibility of creating deep-borehole repositories in crystalline rock formations.
The consortium will drill a more than 16,000-foot hole through a rock formation located near Rugby, North Dakota, in an effort to examine the potential use of boreholes for high-level radioactive waste disposal or geothermal energy development, the Energy Department said Tuesday.
Battelle’s team members in the project are Schlumberger, Solexperts and the University of North Dakota’s Energy and Environmental Research Center.
They will also analyze the geochemical, hydrogeological and geomechanical properties of the test site’s rock formation as well as drilling, wellbore stability, sealing and subsurface characterization problems.
DOE noted that borehole field researchers will not use radioactive material during the test.
